← Dufresne Ministries Podcast
Dufresne Ministries Podcast
Learning The Flow Of The Spirit | Joel & Amy Siegel | Fresno, CA | JTH Crusades 2024 | Friday AM
01:09:25
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A
Hi, I'm Nancy Dufresne. Welcome to our podcast channel. We know you'll be blessed by today's message.
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Y', all, we are so blessed to be here again on it's Friday already and so. But how many know we don't fizzle out around here? Ain't no fizzle. We go. We go out with the afterburners on. Amen and glory to God. We're just so thankful for all that God has given us this week. I mean, you know, if you just think about each service and there's been different things, different themes, and God's help, how many know we need help in a great variety of ways, don't we? If you're like me, I need help in a lot of areas. And God has such a great variety of ways to get his help to us. And we're not done. We're not done. We're going to get some help today. I hope you rested well. Last night. I'm talking about. I didn't so much. Well, you know, I got home and got in bed and God started, you know, I don't like to say he started talking to me, but impressing some things on me would probably be more an accurate thing. And so for about the next hour and a half, I sat there and jotted down what was coming to me and gonna force feed it to you. No, no, no. I'm gonna share it with you today if I can, because if I didn't sleep. You're not sleeping in this service this morning and endeavor to share some of what God has for us if we can. So, you know, if you see me reading some things, that's because I want to get it to you like it came to me. And that's okay. Go to the fifth chapter of the book of James today. Hallelujah. And you might say, well, you guys have gone here every day. Well, you probably ate bread every day. You probably drink coffee every day or something like it or, huh. Why are you doing it every day? Because it's good every day. Amen. And so there's. There's scriptures. It's okay to look at them every day for a couple days. Praise the Lord. Verse 13. Is any among you afflicted? Let him pray. Is any merry? Let him sing psalms. Is any sick among you? Let him call for the elders of the church, Let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord and not the elders. Not the oil. But the prayer of faith shall save the sick. And the Lord shall raise him Up. And if he have committed sins, they shall be forgiven him. Aren't we glad? Verse 16 has kind of been our landing spot. Each day here and today will be the same thing. Confess your faults, one to another and pray for one another. Why say with me that you may be healed? If you're sick, there's good news for you. You may be healed. You may be healed. Permission granted for healing. The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much. We don't use that term avail, you know, hardly at all. It's actually originally a nautical term to turn some things around in a ship. But one of the meanings, you know, we should put it that way. If you look it up in the dictionary, avail. But the amplified translation does a good job of rendering it this way. The effectual heartfelt prayer of the righteous man. I'm not quoting. It just perfectly makes tremendous power available. So there is a power generating aspect of prayer that the believer must cooperate with, and it's essential. We've talked about it a little bit here. There's other of these conferences you could go back and listen to where we really majored on that. And my wife brought out that scripture over in Philippians 1, verse 19 about Paul, said, I know that this talking about his imprisonment, this shall turn through your prayers and as a result of your prayers, the supply of the spirit. Well, see, that's just another way of saying the power that was made available. Amen. We are not going to reap God's harvest without God's power. It will not happen. We've tried methods and gimmicks and gadgets and, you know, all the different, all the different things. And none of those things are wrong if a person is led to do those. Having an outreach with a professional athlete, or somebody was having a conference with a professional athlete, that athlete pulled out at the last minute and somebody recommended me. I thought that was pretty, pretty nice. Because, you know, I mean, I'm not too far removed from a professional athlete, as you can tell, though I was a ball boy for professional women's tennis. Just so you know. So that's just like being a Hall of Fame ballplayer. And I won't share anything else other than that. Praise the Lord. So we need God's power. Not just programs. Not just programs. We need power and power of any kind, naturally, spiritually. The more of it we're talking about, the more care must be exercised in handling it, or it would be better to just not touch it. You know what I'm talking about. You know, electricity is power in this natural realm. If you're not going to handle electricity right, it can burn the place down. Amen. So you know, all these speakers that you see all those speakers, whether they're amplified in the speakers or if there's. I don't know if there's a rack of separate amplifiers. Either way, I promise you it's not one of those old two prongers, you know what I'm talking about? Or even a 3. It's not just 110 plugged into an outlet. Amen. No, you need serious equipment to handle serious power. Amen. And the same thing holds true in the spiritual realm. So through prayer, we can make power available. Well, let's. From here, let's go some places. Power available for what? Can we answer that? What are we. Power available. That sounds good, but for what exactly? Let's just list a few things that I think we'd all agree on. All right? Salvation. Now, you understand that salvation has been perpetually made available when Jesus paid the price. Amen. When the blood was shed, the veil was torn, and we now can come. Jesus said, if I be lifted up, I'll draw all men to me. And so, you know, you don't need a special display of power to get somebody born again. You understand? You can just access very, very easily anybody here. When you got saved, was there a power struggle other than you and your will? No. What do you mean, you and your will? Well, if you're like me, I didn't want. I was resisting this. You know, being raised Jewish, it is just not cool in that community for you to say, I've embraced Jesus. But anyhow, no, there's no power struggle. And you just tapped into a. It's like. It's like you just plugged into the wall, a wall outlet, boom. You didn't even really, really think about, oh, my God, is the power going to flow? Is it not going to flow? Right. On the other hand, there's degrees and measures of power. And if I believe, his pastor last night was made mention of Charles Finney. And so if you study those Finney revivals, there was a notable manifestation of power. My wife and I call it the Finney anointing. We call it that because as we were praying, we started praying that out one time about the restoration of the Finney anointing in our day. And what that was, it was a palpable or tangible presence that brought conviction to people who needed Christ. Conviction. Now, I know about that because I remember my friends were getting me to some church services before I received Christ. And I remember every time they started talking about, come receive Jesus. And given that opportunity, something was on me. Something was on me. But, you know, that can just not be on a person. That can be in the room to where you walk right into it and it sits on people. And what hap. What is that? It's a greater measure of power to bring in a greater harvest. And if I don't see, I'm just being honest because I didn't come here to lie to you. I just don't see us wrapping this thing up without power like that. I don't see our country and other countries going, just naturally speaking, going that direction. We need power available, serious power to reap a serious harvest. So power for what? Well, salvation. Yeah. Power for deliverance. Again, you talk about some of these things. Well, we can get anybody delivered if they'll hear the word, if they'll put some principles into practice, they can tap into God's power that way. But not everybody who's bound with different things is in a place to grasp and lay hold of the things of God. And so we need greater measures or a greater supply of spiritual power so that people that are. I don't mean this disrespectfully, but clueless, like you and me were at one time. Right. So people like us can come in without knowledge and get set free. We need it. We need it. Maybe you don't. I feel like we do and I don't. And again, being honest, I don't feel like we're getting this thing wrapped up without it. So power for salvation, power for deliverance, power for freedom, power for healing. Sure, there's people that have a healing anointing that can minister healing to people. We're thankful for all the different variety. You can hear the word, there's all different things. But you can also come into a place or a church or a service and there be such a saturated atmosphere that it will be like it was said of the healing revivals in the 1940s and 1950s, where they used this phrase. They said healing was in the air. Was it God's will for healing to cease being, Being in the air and just other stuff being in the air? Well, what is in the air? Anything people broadcast in the air, put over the air, speak into the air? Talked about words last night. Words, as it was said, words, are containers, carriers of whatever those words are infused with. If it's doubt and unbelief, it can transmit that. If it's the Power of God. Words can carry that. And so we need healing. Yes. Not just access by principles, but we need healing in the air. In the air. We need greater degrees, manifestations of these things. So you can keep going on with power available for what will? Provision for blessing, right for restoration. Whatever the need, there's power that. That can address that need and bring us out. How is that power made available? We've looked at it. It's not a trick question. We could say, if not the only way, a primary way that power is made available is through effective prayer. Effective prayer. And from here, you know, we could go talk about effective prayer. But again, I'm going to divert a little bit and ask some other questions so we know what the power's for. We understand that power can be made available through prayer. And to clarify, when we talk about power being made available, we're talking about it being at the forefront to where it's very easily accessed. And thank you, the unknowledgeable could tap into it and then get knowledge and then get how many know. It's easier to stop hurting and then get knowledge. Amen. But that power being available is not the same as that power being accessed or fully manifested. Right. As we've used the illustration, I first heard it from Pastor Nancy, the Walmart shelf stocking illustration. If you don't know what I'm talking about, then it's an inside blessing in revelation. No, I can't stop and tell the whole story. My wife also makes reference to it. It's like your pantry being fully stocked. Your pantry being fully stocked is not the same as a full pot of cooked stew. It's not plated. Stocked is not plated and served. But it's available. It's available. But we also. We also must get. We also must get what's available into its fully manifested form. And how does that. How is power brought into manifestation? Well, primarily, again, there's different ways you could talk about, but primarily through the preaching of the word and then responding to the leadings and the promptings of the Spirit. But now that doesn't. That might get things plated and on the table, but what about getting some things into people's lives? That's different. Yet how is power accessed in our lives? Listen real carefully as you hear the word and act on it, and as you discern the promptings of the Spirit and act on. On them. I'll say those two things one more time. How is power accessed in our lives? By hearing the word and acting on it or by discerning the promptings of the Spirit and acting on them. Now, I use the word acting in both of those definitions. And this whole thing about acting is an issue I'd like to speak to if I can. Every preacher knows this. It's not terribly difficult to get people to hear the Word. But getting people to allow that Word to govern their lives, that's a different story. That's a different story. It's not hard to. It's not hard to get people to hear what God's saying. It is a challenge to get people to give action, to give action, to act upon what's being heard or what they're hearing. Amen. Now, we have had and can refer back to different. What we call different revivals in the past. And many of those revivals, if you just put them in the context of what we're talking about here today, were opportunities that God gave his people to be able to do just what we're talking about, hear, respond, act, receive, and get what was available into their lives manifested. That's really what the purpose of many of these revivals or outpourings have been, to help people. Amen. In each of them, power had to be made available. How did it happen? You can go back and read the histories of some of these and you'll find out. They started through prayer. I mean, we talk about Azusa, which to me was one of the greatest. I wasn't, of course, personally there and don't really even know anybody personally. That was. But, you know, you hear the stories about it and you just see the intensity of the power. For something to happen in the early 20th century, before all the, you know, really, newspaper was your means of media and communication. And for something that started in. In a feed barn to circle the globe multiple times and birth different denominations, the Church of God, the Assemblies of God, that takes power. Because if it didn't take power, I would have done it already today in our day. Right. Or you or any of us would have. Any of us that are. That are trying to perpetuate this thing, we would have gotten this done, but the power was there. But we understand that Azusa did not start in the feed barn. It started on. What was it? Was it was that Bonnie Brae street or some other street. Where did it start? But anyhow, it started in an apartment, in a prayer meeting, in a prayer meeting, moved to the feed barn, circled the globe. Amen. We go through and we talk about the healing revival of the 1940s and the 1950s. Well, we know now firsthand from people like Brother Hagin, who testified that he was certainly couldn't have been the only one, but he was one of those who was used to pray that out ahead of time. And he said. He said, I was just compelled to get up and in the middle of the night, often from 2 to 4am just to spend time on my knees. He said I'd go out by the stove in the house where it was warm, and he said I'd kneel down there. And I just thank God for all. He said, especially I would pray for the full manifestation of what we would call those gifts of power, working of miracles, the gift of faith and the different gifts of healings. And he said, I just call them out. And he said, one night I'm doing that or praying that way. And, well, actually, I don't think that was at night. I think this was another time where he was having an extended time of prayer. But at the end of this time of prayer, he said, the word of the Lord came to me and said, at the close of World War II will come a revival of divine healing to America. He wrote it down, dated it, put it in his wallet, and it happened. It happened. You see, it was a movement of power, but it was preceded by prayer. And every revival will be the same thing. But if you just pray and don't learn to give action to some things, all you'll have is a full pantry. So these revivals really were all about action. Action. If you like action movies. My wife and I do like action movies. I won't just tell you just exactly which ones, but your mission, should you choose to accept it. Yes, we do. Yes, we do. I think she's got the hots for one of the stars of that movie. I don't, and I for sure do. Okay, no, I only have only have eyes for you. But really, the reason we identify with movies like that is we're living an action movie. We are living. People think it's fiction we're supposed to be living. It's the superhero movies. They have fancier costumes than I wear. But that's not any different than what we're. If you're living, if you're really living this thing, you have. You have an extra little grin about all these, what other people call fiction because, you know, this is my reality. I live this. I live this. I don't mean. I don't mean the constant stress and never sleeping like you know what I'm talking about. I just mean our lives are supposed to be an action movie that exciting that exciting. And so. But we know this when it comes to acting on the word, people aren't going to always act their own. When I say act, I mean giving appropriate action to what's being heard or acting in response to the movement of the unseen One, the Holy Spirit. People aren't going to always act on their own. They will need help. They will need help and teaching to learn how to appropriately respond and. And encouragement to do so and the opportunity to do so. And they'll need. So they'll need help. The thing is, you don't, you know, like pastors, for example, we don't live with all of our people every day, all the time, in their homes, weeks. We see them when we assemble together, when we come together, right? And so one of the ways people will get their help to learn how to act in response to the movement of the Spirit is as we're gathered together. And when we're gathered together, God will bring us opportunities corporately so that you can succeed privately. He'll give us opportunities to act corporately so you can succeed privately. One of the biggest ways this happens, one of the biggest opportunities God brings us to learn to act, is corporate flows of the Spirit where all can act on power that's been made available and experience the benefit. Why must all act? Because God wants to use us all individually. You know, some of the other revivals, for example, we talked about the healing revival, those primarily required the faith and obedience and action of the healing evangelists, the ministers. They had to sense God's movement. They had to respond to God's movement. And of course, people had to come and receive. But there wasn't just a whole lot required of the individuals. We're in a different day. We're in a different era. God, God's plan is not, you know, generally speaking, there's a lot of similarity from one end of the spectrum of his plan to another, his plan for the earth. But he'll emphasize different things at different times. And his plan for our day will not just be fulfilled only by people occupying a pulpit. Can't be, can't be, can't be. Can't be requires the pulpit and the pew, everybody knowing how to respond, everybody learning how to give action to make power available and then act appropriately in response to that power. That's required. It's required for our day. It's a little bit different than some of what happened in the past, but there are many who have prophesied about our day. Can you come and just share and bring a bottle of Water with you for me? No, thank you. Share. You know what? I want you to share what you were reading to me the other day about Brother George.
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Brother George Stormont. He was a minister. He was a young man when Reverend Smith Wigglesworth was an older man almost. Well, Wigglesworth died when he was 87. And so he knew him the last few years of Brother Wigglesworth's life. And then Reverend George Stormont went. He actually ministered oftentimes on the life of Smith Wigglesworth and told stories and things that he knew. But he actually mentioned something that Smith prophesied the week before he died. He died at 87. He was doing a week long crusade the week before he went home.
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That's the way to go.
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That's the way to go. He was at 87 years old. He was ministering and he told the pastor before one of the services. Now we know Brother Smith. He prophesied to Lester Sumrall to different ones about. And he listed out different waves and revivals that would come. The charismatic move, the Word of faith and things. But this was interesting to me. He said, he actually condensed things and said, before Jesus comes, there will be a new outpouring of the Spirit. What we have seen, and this is in 1947, what we have seen has been a restoration of the gifts of the Holy Spirit. There will come a revival of the Word of God. We know that as the Word of Faith. And when these two moves of the Spirit combine, the Word, the Word and the restoration of gifts, the Spirit, we shall see the greatest move the Church of Jesus Christ has ever seen.
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Yeah. Thank you. So instead, instead of going through and saying, you know, Azusa revival and this one and charismatic and all the different ones, like he did with Dr. Sumrall, which is fine, but he just lumped it together and said, spirit and word and spirit, word and spirit. And really the person that I heard coined that phrase and really perpetuate that phrase was Dr. Dufresne. He called that word in the Spirit. So that's when I said, the era that we're in requires some things of all people. The Word and Spirit era is different than some of these others. Amen. And you just got a prophetic preview of some of what that will be. So what do we need to do? We need to make power available, but then we need to learn how to appropriately respond to that power. We need to learn how to act. Now, I believe one of the reasons the Lord put this on my heart for today is because we had, we had fresh in our mind because we had a segment of the service last night that went that way to where we had the opportunity corporately to sense the power that had been made available and to respond to that power. So we have a fresh illustration with which to which to teach. Now, if you weren't here last night, what did we have? Well, there was a last night, toward the end of the service, there was a spiritual flow with corresponding expressions. You listen, it was a spiritual flow. Pastor Nancy was leading the service. Pastor Noel ministered some things about a flow of joy and responding to a flow of joy. And it seemed like that was the catalyst by which some further things happened after that. Right. And one of the things we just love about spirit led services is that there's so many different. I call them bridges. Sometimes this person will have a part and it's just a bridge to the next part and a bridge to the next part. And, you know, the job of the minister is really to navigate and to correctly assess, okay, what's supposed to happen. Now, sometimes you only know in a very, very general sense, and you watch it play out and you're like, okay, yeah, I got it. And so there was a spiritual flow with corresponding expressions. Well, let's talk about what were these expressions. Some of them, there was dancing, there was laughing, maybe shouting, could be running. I don't think that was last night necessarily, but that would be a expression in this same category. And then really just excessive fullness to the point of spiritual inebriation or spiritual saturation. Right. And perhaps if you were in this last night, that may have been your first, because we understand that there's always a greater audience and different ones are newer to the ministry and newer to different things, but might be your first exposure to that. And you might be thinking, what in the world was that? Others, you may have been in this long enough to say, I understand that. And then others might have said, oh, that. Now, I've been in situations like last night. I've been in them constantly for over 30 years. And I'm not naive enough to suggest that every single thing that happens during those times is always actually the genuine flow of God. Because it's not just God flowing, it's God prompting and people cooperating. God's prompting is always God. Our response may or may not be. Our response may or may not be in perfect alignment with that. But certainly last night there was enough that was genuine and real to use it as an illustration. Aren't we glad? But, you know, the thing is, those expressions I mentioned the dancing, the running, the laughing, the shouting. See, all of those can be performed in the flesh, meaning they can be performed apart from a response to God as well as in response to God. And so if they're offered, if those things are offered without God being involved and are just being mimicked, well, really, at least starting out, they're going to be in the flesh. The thing about all this is we have an extraordinarily accommodating Father who will help us. Even if he will try to help steer us, even if we start in the flesh, he'll help us get in the Spirit. And sometimes things start out in the flesh and then end up in the Spirit. Sometimes part of the crowd is in the flesh. Part of the crowd is in the Spirit. Amen. Rarely is the entire crowd in the Spirit, but it does happen. And when these expressions are performed at the direction of the Spirit, God's anointing attaches to those expressions. And then the whole exercise can be considered a move of the Spirit and spiritual fruit will result. Meaning all the things that we said we want to happen when we make prayer available, salvation, healing, deliverance, those things can happen because it's the anointing that causes those things to happen. But those expressions. When. When I'll say it again, those expressions, when performed in response to God's Spirit, can be inhabited by God's Spirit. Just as an even more recent example, the music today, because that wasn't like a rare. That's a. That's a more common flow. Praise and worship is an even more common flow than some of the. Maybe what we saw last night doesn't have to be uncommon, but it's not every single service. Right? But praise and worship is a more common flow. But did you notice that as we took things a little bit further today and kept saying some of the same things over and over, what happened? You started sensing. You started sensing more of God. Because, see, God inhabits praise. That's why we never miss an opportunity to enter in. You don't miss these opportunities, and you enter in fully, wholehearted. Wholeheartedly doesn't mean you're always demonstrating or doing something crazy or anything like that. It means that wholeheartedly, you're. Or just say it this way, you're all in. We're all in on these things. Because, again, God's. Just like for Paul and Silas. And as they prayed and sang praises, God's power inhabited what they were doing and caused their situation to turn in a remarkable way. Well, God's the same yesterday, today, and forever. If we will do what Paul and Silas did, we can have the same results. Prayer and praise is not a sovereign move. You can access that anytime. There are other things that are more spirit initiated that where we respond to. But see things like last night, we need to recognize that for what it is. It is a pass back. Hindi stuko rabad ben isin.de raban mad saint sendan sada times of refreshing from the presence of the Lord are not just for feeling good, but therefore learning more, therefore gaining skill, therefore taking power and taking it to the world. So learn these things, develop the skill and be of greater use in the kingdom of God. Amen. Thank you, Father. Well, we yielded to God, but I did lose my train of thought. But it's coming to me. It's coming to me. Say again? Yeah. So you know, these. These are corporate training sessions. They're just. Just like praise and worship is a training session. Just. Just like receiving from the word when it's being preached and responding appropriately at times. That's training. The more you yield appropriately, the more skill you gain. When you refuse to yield appropriately or you don't yield, you lose skill. Hallelujah. So when these expressions are performed at the direction of the spirit, we think sometimes, well, they're just. They're just laughing. No, it's not just laughing. If I wanted to laugh, there's movies I can watch like that. I. Right. I don't. Meaning I don't have to. I don't have to dress up and come here. If I'm just laughing, I can watch a comedy, you know, watch just something funny. No, it's not just laughing. It's. It's God infused laughter. It's expression that's carrying a flow, a flow of deliverance, a flow of healing, a flow of blessing. And it's also training to where you and I can better recognize the movement of the spirit. Again, I've been in meetings, I've been in different moves like what we had last night, which was just a relatively contained small segment of the service. But I've been in this for decades. And you want to know what's probably revolutionized my prayer life more than anything? Being in and participating in those times. Why? Because the training I got in, how to recognize the spirit and respond the spirit is the same. Newsflash for all of us. It's the same Holy Spirit. The same Holy Spirit in your prayer life. Amen. And so I'm saying this at God's direction and with the weight that's on this today. For a couple reasons. Number one, I told you that not always is there a unified flow. You always have people who don't know, and you always have people who truthfully would wish it just would go away a little bit. I mean, not here in Fresno, but, you know, sad to say, in some of the suburbs. So rarely, rarely do these spiritual moves accomplish all they are intended to or all that they could, because it's rare that the congregation participates with, with a full unity. Amen. And I'd like to help, and I want you to notice I don't think you can sense any kind of critical tone here. There's not, there's not. We're not. It's not critical. There is absolutely no shame in. And having never learned these things, the only shame is refusing to. Amen. Amen. And so you usually, like I said, you usually have some who are all in, some who politely go along and some who wish it would stop. Amen. Praise the Lord. If you won't participate in his movement corporately, you won't be accurate in your life individually. And if you're not following the Spirit, ministry and life on a daily basis, you're following tradition and religion and thinking it's the Holy Spirit. I'm not going to say it again. Rewind the tape. We say the tape. Rewind. Go back to the YouTube and find it now. I'm going to say it again. Come on. If you're not following the Spirit in ministry and life, you're following tradition and religion and thinking it's the Holy Spirit. So the last major revival that the Body of Christ has seen, in my opinion, I don't think that I'm anybody in terms of the all knowing anything, you understand that I'm learning like you're learning. But I have, but I have a voice, especially in this area. I have some authority because of my assignment. But in my opinion, the last major revival the Body of Christ saw was the beginnings of revival that resembled what we had last night. It was revival of manifestations of the Spirit, divine joy, the flow of joy, and learning how to cooperate with that. And it was God's plan, just like we already heard from my wife. It was God's plan that the Body of Christ be revived in this way so that all the Word could come together with manifestations of the Spirit and bring about the revival that would usher in the return of Christ. But before we could get there, that revival, I was in it, I watched it, and I can speak from firsthand experience. That revival crashed to a halt and we haven't been in revival since. I'm not saying we haven't had a move of the Spirit since. I'm not saying that we've had that here this week. But when we speak of revival, we're talking about a major, extended, developed move of the Spirit, if we could say it that way, that we haven't seen. And so now there are entire. There's a generation that's never really experienced the atmosphere of revival. I know. I've heard Pastor Nancy talk about her experience, which is the same as mine. We came into the body of Christ, we got saved during revival, and we thought it was normal. We didn't realize that we were in revival. Well, really, revival is normal. The era of the backslidden church is what's not normal. And I just want to say to you, if you've never really experienced revival, and we could stand here and tell you stories and stories and stories. If you've never experienced, I want you to know you have a right to. You have a right to. And you can get in God's face. I don't mean rudely. You know what I mean? But you can get in God's face and you can say. You can say, I ain't leaving to where I will see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. Amen. Meaning we can contend for this. You have a right to. You have a right to contend and say we see it. Amen. So why did things come to a halt? Why do things shut down? Yoke, Is this okay? This morning, we. All right. Why do things shut down? Well, one word that I could bring into this would be division. Division. God doesn't operate by division. He prefers multiplication. Adding and subtracting, way too slow. God works by multiplication. The devil works by division. All right, so. So many people during this time did not like the direction that things were going that the body really split. People, they just weren't comfortable with what they were seeing. What were they seeing? The same things we saw last night. Rejoicing, laughing, dancing praise. That was a little bit too exuberant. Conveniently enough, there was an alternate flow that had risen and was just waiting for those who didn't care for what was going on. We today call it the seeker movement. And it was a wonderful landing spot where everybody. Yeah, I'm saying it. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I said it. Yeah, I said it. It was a wonderful landing spot for everybody that didn't want to go along with these things could land. And now, Today, really, almost three decades, 25, we'll just say, 25 years later, quarter of a century later, we see the fruit, Or lack thereof. Or lack thereof. But the body of Christ aborted the move of God because it wasn't packaged in a form that they liked. Now, before it showed up, we were all about revival. Before we were crying out for it. Oh, God, send it. Oh, God, send it. Oh, God, send it. And then it shows up and we're like, not quite like that. That's not what I was talking about. That's not what I was asking for. Send one where I just have to sit there. Send one where I don't have to do anything. Send one where I can just watch at home. So it was packaged in a form that required the crucifying of one's flesh, laying down one's pride, and engaging in spiritual expressions that manifested physically. I sing because you are good, and I dance. And folk didn't like it because they don't like doing that in front of everybody. Well, who would? Who would? Anybody here. Every time you get in a crowd of people, do you have a sudden urge to just run in front of them or to get up and start dancing in front. No, no, because that's not normal for your flesh, which is exactly the element we need to remove from the situation in order to flow with God. And so far, like, I'm not going to dance in front of everybody. Why? Ain't nobody going to force you? And when enough people vote to abstain, a movement can be quenched. I watched it happen. I was there. I saw it happen. And I heard the chit chat because I was in the epicenter of it. I was working for the. For the leader of it. And I heard the chit chat. And I saw. I saw the division, even among staff, where certain ones would sit in the back of the room and not participate because they didn't like it. Because it wasn't a teaching outline. There was actually plenty of teaching. There was actually plenty of teaching, but it wasn't just teaching. I just like teaching. Well, they didn't like the package. They backed out. You know, it reminded me of another group that didn't like how some things were packaged. We don't like food that rains down from the sky. And so they refused to recognize and get on board with what God was doing in their day. And so they got to die in the wilderness. And that's what we've been enjoying now for the past couple decades. We've been watching things die in the wilderness. And if you want to. If you want to be around A long time and be used a long time. Just get on board with what God's doing. My wife and I have. We call him a friend. It's amazing. He's 91, about to be 92 years old. He lives in Buffalo, New York. A gentleman very dear to us named Tommy Reed, you met him, he came to Fredonia and he had a church of like 100 people. And he could not get it to grow past that. Could not get it to grow past that. And this was during the Charismatic movement, where there were so many things happening, even in the Catholic church. Well, in Buffalo is a very, very Catholic area. And so all of the evangelical pastors were like, no, no, no, no, no. Can't be. Can't be happening in the Catholic Church. Nope, can't be God. Can't be God. And oh, Lord, bring the people to our church. Bring people to our church. Help us grow. Send revival. Send true revival to us in our. In our church. And God spoke to this man one day. He said. He said, would you just get on board with what I'm doing? And it so shocked him, and he realized he was judging what was going on. And he said, yes, sir. And he said, go down to the basilica where they're having services and I'll show you. Some of it's me. Some of it's me. Well, he did. He befriended. And besides, you know, when people come into it from a tradition like that, they need to be mentored in the Word and understand something. So now he's friends with all these. With all these different ones. And God's moving different things. Is all of it. Is all of it in our evangelical tradition? No, it wasn't. It wasn't. But he was getting on board with what God's doing. Well, the bishops found out about it, kicked them all out, and in one week, his church grew from 100 to 850 people. Because where are you going to go? We all got kicked out of the basilica. They all came to his church. Church. And in the 1970s, 1980s, there was. It's a church of 3,000 now, you know, And I mean, all these people flooded into this church. Why? Because a man decided, I'm not going to crystallize here in what I'm familiar with. I'm not going to die on the vine. I'm going to find out what God's doing, and I'm going to go with what God's doing. And that's how not to die in the wilderness. Amen. And so, you know, we, as a body of Christ, in some respects, we've been in purgatory here for. To keep the Catholic thing going here. So what do we have to do? Watching all the flesh churches grow while ours aren't, you know, aren't so much. But so what do we have to do? This is genius. You ready? I got the answer. You want to know genius? Right here. You have to find out where we unhooked, you have to go there, and you have to hook back up. That's it? That's it. I should get an honorary degree for that. Yeah. The only way to hook back to the plan of God is find out where you unhooked. God is strategic. There was a reason we were there in the first place. There was a reason we were there. And so, you know, just real interesting because, you know, all these decades have passed. There's. There's little pockets of the move of God and things like what we had last night, but not so much widespread. Well, it's just real interesting to me. I was watching not too long ago a service online or a conference. And this. This conference, I certainly won't mention any names, but there were people, names that many would know even sitting here in this room, and some good ministers, good ministry. And evidently the night before, they had had a move similar to what we experienced last night. And then the following morning, the man who was up speaking, very respected in the body of Christ, and he said, before I speak, I want to address what happened last night, share some things. He actually played a clip of a service I was in with Brother hagin from the 1990s, and that individual was also in that service. I was in that service. I even saw myself. Why did I wear suspenders? When was that a thing where everybody. You remember when everybody wore suspenders? And I mean, the spirit of God fell. Boom. And not only did the spirit of God fell, people responded. And there. And there was things. And this man even said that for the next five months, I was under the effects of that power for the next. For the next five months. But then the pastor, talking about it, started making some really curious statements because he hadn't been in it for all these years. And he said, now this isn't just for everybody. And he said one of the reasons is these things don't fit. Said not all these manifestations fit everybody's personality. I'm not calling names. I won't call names. Trust me. We're safe. We're safe. So they don't fit people's personalities. Some people just like to sit and enjoy what's going on without participating. And that's. Right. And we should let them do that. Is that okay? Is that. Is that. Huh? Why y' all say no? If God's spirit is moving in a corporate setting and he's. I just. I'm not saying. I'm just saying. You know what I'm saying? If God's spirit is moving and there's an anointing to dance, maybe everybody doesn't sense it, but maybe the leader suggests it by the spirit. Or maybe enough people that do know the flow start participating in that. And you just say, that's not my personality. Is it anybody's. Is it anybody's. Do you really think it's my personality to just start dancing? I've never. I missed every school dance. I didn't. I missed every one of them. I missed all my training sessions. Hush it, pastor duncan. It's not my personality. God never asked you to manifest your personality. Personality is part of your soul. He's not asking you to manifest your soul. He's not asking you to manifest your presence. He's your preference is what I'm trying to say. He's not asking you to manifest your preference. He's actually trying to get you to lay aside all of those things and learn. When there's a prompting to dance, you just. You just do it. Forget about whether I like it or who asked you whether you like it. And some folk are like, I'm not comfortable shouting. Why do you do it at home, then? Now you're on board. Now you're on board. Oh, I see. No, if we'll get you in the right environment, you can shout. You're just used to doing it from your flesh. But if we can get you to get that flesh laid aside and get you over to where you're used to following the spirit, then instead of manifesting the presence of the devil with your shout, you can. Oh, I'm sorry. Did I offend somebody? Then you can manifest the presence of God with the shout. Yeah. Yeah. I don't shout. I will shout in the service. When it's God, I will shout. It's not my personality. I just know what's on the other side of the shout. And the thing is, you don't always know what's on the other side of the shout. We love telling the story. We won't tell the whole story about the time when my wife ran into a house. I don't mean with a car. I mean we were in a service. Fredonia, New York, in the old building. Fredonia People, you know what I'm talking about. We were in the old building in Fredonia, New York, and the spirit of God came upon my wife and said, run. And she's like, not this song. I don't like this song. Did anybody. I don't remember. Has God really ever asked you, do you like this song? Are you okay? Is this. If we do a. Are you okay with that beat? Do you like it slow? Do you like it fast? Has God asked anybody? Hear that? No, you get what you get. And if the anointing is attached to it and there's a prompt, if there's a prompting to run, you see if there's a prompting to do it, you might say, I didn't sense anything, did everybody else? Then if the majority of the people who are somewhat knowledgeable sensed it, it's there, Jump in. And then you'll sense it next time. Well, that's not my beat. No, no, no. You don't get a beat. You just use them all. They're all good. They're all good with the anointing. They're all good with the anointing. They're all bad without it. We get used to a beat and people recognize the beat and think, that's the anointing. It's just an empty loop, honey. You can have an empty beat or you can have a God filled beat. Amen. And when you jump in and when you respond and you and you dance or whatever the case is, or in my case. So my wife said, I didn't like the song. Then now all of a sudden, remember that conviction from the Finney revival, now that's on her because she missed God. And so you start praying things like, well, let me let that come on me again. And he will, he will. I'm getting warmed up. Are you all good? I'm just now getting. He will, he'll let it come on you again. When you get that next chance. Chance, when that anointing comes back. Jump, jump. Jump in. Jump in. Just do it. Just do it. Just do it. Do it, do it. Just do it. And so run. And you know, I think the first time I didn't like the song. The second time, nobody else is running. Oh, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I forgot. Nobody can run alone. Sure you can. And so she finally did. She ran, she got away, she got back. And then later I hear said when I got back to my seat, God said, you just got your house. You just got your house. Now the story, which I cannot take time to tell the Whole thing. But the very, very, very, very, very short version of it is we had sold our house and were about to buy another one which was a total fixer. Going to be a years long project, you know, rehab and a foreclosure type thing, this and that and that. Didn't like it anyhow. And all of a sudden, all of a sudden God did a switcheroo and put in its place her dream house. You could park a small aircraft in the kitchen. It was that big. A dream, dream house for where, I'll say it this way, for where we were at the time. An absolute dream house. We lived in. It had no business being there. Why she ran and I ran, I ran. And then that minister that I, that I heard, he said, well you know, and said ministers, unless you're specially anointed for this, you shouldn't try to have this in your church. If you don't listen, can I, can I, can I, can I, can I? If you don't have this, your church will die. Now I don't mean, I don't mean the, I don't mean when you're first pioneering, it takes, you know, you have to develop a congregation that can take a good amount of time. But I'm just talking about if you don't, if you don't let the Spirit move, your church will die. D Y E D. And if A. And if A. Since we're already, since we're on it, Brother Hagin called it. Can we sweep up under the rug and behind the. If a pastor won't wholeheartedly hunger for and participate in the move of the Spirit, that their church will never have it. The church will never have it. And you can pray all day and all night and still you'll make a supply available, but you won't have results. The power that's available will never be delivered into the lives of the people because they haven't been taught to respond to God when he moved. Hallelujah. It's a bit sad because in some ways we're a little bit farther off today. I'm talking about as a whole body. We're a little bit farther than, away from some things than we were 30 years ago. And that's sobering. That means the plan of God's not progressing as it should. Means the harvest isn't getting reaped like it should. Means that we're not really just a day closer to wrapping this all up. Amen. So speaking of wrapping things up, that's part one, closing the Bible. Everyone must embrace. I mean wholeheartedly embrace the move of God, the flow of God, and seek to develop skill in cooperating with his movement. If preachers don't learn this, you won't preach the right sermons. People won't. You won't sing the right songs. You'll give prophetic words out of your soul instead of out of your spirit. You will have a flesh church. Amen. Amen. Let me just see if there's any more of this, because I didn't really get through much of it. So let me just see if there's any more of this that needs to happen before we let you go to day. Please.
- [64:11]
A
Praise the Lord. Hallelujah. We have a friend who was part of that revival. When Brother Hagin was stepping into the flow of the spirit, they started attending some of those meetings and they did not like it. And they were. Some of those that were sitting in the last row of the balcony and would. They would refer to. Refuse to jump in. The whole time they're praying, Lord, use us in ministry. Lord, help us flow in the gifts. Help us do this. You know, help us be more effective in our ministry. And, you know, the Spirit finally dealt with them. If you don't jump into what I'm doing, you can't go any further. So she said, I finally decided, next time, whatever happens, I'm just gonna. When the dancing starts, I'm just. I'm just gonna. I'm just gonna do it. I'm just gonna step in. Whether I sent whatever, she goes, I'm just gonna do it. And she did. And the power of God hit her when she step. Made the step to do that. But here's the point. When they were out ministering, she and her husband were out ministering. A few weeks later, she is ministering. And all of a sudden, tongues comes out. An interpretation of tongues comes out. All of a sudden, she's calling out words of knowledge and people are healed. And they got home, back to the hotel that night. And her husband said, boy, that was different. How'd you know to go that direction? And she said, it was the same prompting as when I stepped into the dance. It was the same anointing. This is so important. This is not just to run around the room and have a fun time. It's to learn how to connect. Pastors, ministers. It's not just for people to be refreshed. Refreshed and leave laughing. It's for us to learn and know. So that when we're ministering and something prompts us, we know, oh, that's a tongue and we can flip over into the gifts of the Spirit.
- [66:32]
B
Yeah, you know, I'm thinking of another. Another minister, actually, pretty prominent minister who was in all these meetings with us but kept himself out every time the flow started to go. Anything that we would call juicy. You know what I mean? Juicy. Anytime the spirit began to move or fall and people were giving expressions, they'd always say, back out, back out, back out. And they're a successful minister today. But they will preach on the move of the Spirit. They will preach the power of God down. And I just noticed this. They have no idea what to do. And the spirit will fall, just fall on the place and they'll. They'll close the service, walk out of the room not. Not being disrespectful. They don't even recognize why what you keep yourself out of, you have no skill in. And. And listen, we need to guard against that. Don't. We need to guard against that. Listen, there are people. Anytime I'm preaching, and even if it starts to sort of go that way, they'll get up and leave my service. Well, it's a free country, right? It's a free country. But I hope you never really need to hear from God. I hope you. So we need to kind of consecrate ourselves to this a little bit. You know what I mean? And again, there's no shame in not knowing or being new to you. There's only shame in keeping yourselves out of something, because what will people think? How will it look? That's pride. That's pride. And so, you know, for ministers, you need to. If you don't know this flow well enough to bring to your church, and you have an established church, well, bring somebody in who knows. Bring brother Tony in. He knows this flow. Bring me in to play piano for him. That would really help put him in the Spirit. Amen. Say that.
- [68:43]
A
Get to these services.
- [68:44]
B
Get to these services where there is.
- [68:47]
A
Services, where the flow of God can move in any direction. Sometimes it's teach, teach, teach, teach. And if that's the direction of the spirit, that's what we want. But if we go with the flow, we need to be in a place that. That knows how to flow so that we can learn that flow. Praise the Lord.
- [69:06]
B
Amen.
- [69:06]
A
Hallelujah. We trust you've enjoyed this message. Visit us at dufresneministries.org to learn of our upcoming meetings, share your testimony, become a partner, or visit our online store. This program has been made possible by the friends and partners of Dufresne Ministries.