Experiencing God's Desire for You

God is awesome. Let's pray together. God, what an amazing God that you would surround us with this type of grace and love and companionship. Yeah.

You didn't just save us, but, You are with us. You didn't save us by grace, but then you get ticked at us. Lord, you never get angry with us who are your people because all of your anger was fully absorbed by Jesus on the cross. There is now only love and grace and fellowship.

From your heart to us. And you desire for this to be our experience. Step By step. Step by step, every step we take.

We're surrounded by grace and love. And you're warm. Fellowship with your spirit. Bless us, Lord, as we process these things in our care groups tonight and seek to internalize them in our lives in the days of this coming week.

Thank you for Jesus, for the cross and making all these things possible. In His name we pray. And all God's people said, If you want to give a title to the message this morning, it would be experiencing God's desires for you, experiencing God's desires for you. We're going to see the desire of God for us as believers in this text.

I think all of us have at some point in our lives, if not several times like me, have, have contemplated. What we might do if we were given 3 wishes. In fact, raise your hand. How many of you at any point in your life, have just thought about or even talked about what you might do if you were given 3 wishes where you could wish for anything you want.

How many of you have thought about that? OK. we, I, we all think about that. I, I remember watching a Twilight Zone episode, a while back where a guy got 3 wishes, and all of them backfired on him.

And so that makes you even think more. It's like, well, what would I wish for that would not backfire on me? But we think about this. about a week ago, I was walking through our dining room and my son Brendan said, Dad, I'm like, what?

He says, I know what I would wish for if I had 3 wishes. That just came out of the blue. We weren't talking about that, but he was thinking about it, and I'm like, what would you wish for? And he says, my first wish would be for an infinite supply of wishes.

And so, just on his own, he's just contemplating what he would do if he had those wishes. I remember a number of years ago asking my daughter, Brooke, what she would wish for if she had one wish. And at the time, this is not where her heart is now, but at the time, Her wish was to have every Beanie Baby in the world. She wanted to own every Beanie Baby in the world.

Around the same time, I asked my son Brendan, again, this was a while back, what he wished for and I don't remember his exact answer, but it had something to do with world domination. wanted to be the dictator of the world or something to that effect. And I trust that he has grown from that also. But here's, here's what I want us to think about, this morning.

If you came to God and said, God, if you had 3 wishes, What would they be? The great thing about God's wishes is he can make them happen, OK? So let's rephrase the question, God. If you had 3 wishes with regard to me.

What three things would you wish for? Whatever God's reply to that question would be. I think it would sound very similar to 2 Corinthians 13:14. Paul is closing the book, talking to some messed up Christians.

And he gives a benediction. And we see Paul's heart for the Corinthians in this, but understand that Paul is being inspired by the Spirit, inspired by God. So this is the heart of God for the Corinthians. and hence the heart of God for us.

So I don't want us to just, see Paul's heart for the Corinthians as we look at this passage, but I want us to see God's heart for us today, as we look at this passage. let's read it together, verse 14. Paul says, the grace or may the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all. Let's rephrase that.

Number 1 may the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. Number 2 may the love of God be with you all. And number 3 may the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with You all, those are the three things Paul wished to be the experience of the Corinthians. And these are the 3 things I think that God would desire.

This is the heart of our Father speaking through Paul. These are 3 things that God desires for us in our lives from day to day. Now, understand again, that Paul is dealing with some messed up Christians. in the Corinthian church, they were getting drunk.

at their church potlucks. The rich were showing up early and bringing the best food, and they were eating at the potluck before the poor would arrive. So some would be drunk and so full of food, and the poor who would arrive later, were left hungry with nothing or little to eat. They were taking each other to court.

There were fightings and factions in the church. There was immorality that was. going on amongst people in the Corinthian church, and they were doing theological gymnastics to justify that immorality. Many of them were moving away from the gospel, becoming enamored with the wisdom of this world.

It's a church that if, if it, if there's a church exactly like the Corinthian church down the street from our church, we probably would want to have very little to do with them. And with the people of that church. Paul makes a lot of progress after writing 1 Corinthians. He writes 2 Corinthians, a lot of progress has been made, but there's still some really messed up people in the Corinthian church.

In fact, you come into chapter 13. And Paul begins to address specifically, the group in the Corinthian church that still did not respect him. And they disrespected his apostleship, and said, Paul's not a real apostle. And Paul, read chapter 13 sometime.

Paul basically says, those of you that doubt whether I'm an apostle, just wait till I get there when I pay you guys a visit. You will see the power of God supernaturally displayed in discipline through me. And you will have plenty of proof that I am truly an apostle of Jesus Christ. You want proof, you're going to get that if you continue to oppose me and the ways of God., through my ministry.

So there's still in the Corinthian church, people that just have a bad attitude towards Paul. And yet, this is amazing. And this brings me comfort, verse 14, the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you. All, every one of you, even the messed up ones, even those of you that still have a lot of stuff that's in your life, that I'm trying to deal with and confront.

This is my desire for you who still have much sin in your life. And this is the desire of God, even for those of us in this room, like me, who have a million miles to go, and many, many ways that we're still messed up. People like me who just this past week have much to be ashamed about the heart of God towards us. is that the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ would be with us, and experienced by us, the love of God, the love of the Father would be with us and experienced by us, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit would be with us and experienced by us.

And so, man, even if you've had a terrible week, maybe you're here today and you got saved last Sunday. And you, you were really excited last Sunday, but now you just feel beaten down like what a disaster of a week and the stuff that I did, I've sinned and surely God's fed up with me by now, and man, this isn't turning out very well and And maybe, maybe you're starting to think God's angry with you. how dare you be this way after all I've done for you? And listen, I want you of all people to just see the heart of your Father today, the way he is towards you today.

Through this passage. Here's the three desires of God. Let's just look at each one. Number 1, the first desire of God towards you, is that the grace of Jesus Christ would be with you at all times.

God desires for you to experience His grace at all times. Now, grace in the New Testament, the The best way to define it, it is, it is the ill deserved favor of God, not the undeserved favor of God, but the ill deserved favor of God. Please understand that distinction. It's very important.

And I'll show you the distinction. I've shared this with you guys before. If you're employed, let's say I'm employed at a company and I don't go into work for a week, and I do no work, nothing that benefits the company. But at the end of the week, I go to my boss, and I say, I know I haven't come into work at all, and have not worked for the company, but could you give me a paycheck anyway?

If the boss wrote me a check and said, here's a paycheck, he's being very kind, but that's not biblical grace, because it doesn't go far enough. If, however, I not only did not work for a week, but during that week, I snuck into the company compound during the night, and I stole a bunch of stuff, and I set the place deliberately on fire, and the business burned down. And it just so happened that when the business burned down, the boss's only son was in the building and was killed in the fire.

And then at the end of that, me not working at all, and doing what I did against the boss, if I came to the boss and said, hey, I've had a really bad week.

you and I've had a bad week. I didn't work at all, plus, I did all of this. here's what I'm asking, can you find it in your heart to forgive me? And can you find it in your heart somehow to Give me a paycheck.

And the boss says, what, I forgive you. And I'm not just going to give you a paycheck. I'm going to write you a check for a million dollars. Here.

That's grace. That's ill deserved favor. Paul is telling us, God is telling us that the favor of God that you enjoy every day. Not only have you not earned it, but it's the opposite of what you've earned.

But here's the crazy thing, it's yours. It's yours anyway, and the father says, I want. My grace. To be with you wherever you go.

That's, that's his desire for you. On good days, bad days. He wants his grace to be with you. Now, we know biblically that God's grace always goes with us, whether we're conscious of that, experiencing that, His grace is always there, even when we're off in sin and doing the opposite of what we should be doing.

And so I don't know that Paul is simply saying, may God's grace go with you wherever you go. I think the spirit of what Paul is saying is may you experience the reality of His grace that is with you at all times. And so let's just think about for a brief moment, how can I daily experience the presence of this grace of the Lord Jesus? And those of you that are young believers or new believers, please listen to this because this is Christianity 101 right here.

the way that you can daily experience, in a meaningful way, the presence of the grace of Jesus in your life is number one, realize that you have been saved by grace unto grace, and for the glory of grace. Everything is grace from beginning to end. God saved you by His grace. He saved you to bring you into the experience.

of His grace, and he saved you for the glory of His grace. look at, look at this in Scripture in Ephesians 2. Paul says, by grace, you've been saved, by grace, you have been saved in Ephesians 2:58, he wants you to know the salvation that you now possess, you didn't earn it at all, at all. there was someone who was here last Sunday, who sat under a clear gospel presentation.

And at the end of that gospel presentation, said to somebody else, I still think that our good works have to count for something. Still putting their trust in their works, wanting to earn the salvation. Listen, we've been saved by grace. Saved by grace, not by works of righteousness, and therefore, you stay saved by grace, not because you earn it.

And somehow you endear God's heart towards you to where he'll let you stay saved for another day because you've earned it. And you've been a good boy or a good girl. So you've been saved by grace, you stay saved by grace, but also you've been saved unto grace. There's so much grace that God wants to give you, even after he saved you.

In fact, he would say one of the main reasons I saved you is so that I can lavish my grace upon you. And John 1:16, John says, for of Christ's fullness, we have all received even grace upon grace. And the picture is of, almost, almost of like ocean waves. Imagine yourself standing on the beach and you're just waiting in the ocean.

There's this massive ocean of grace. And here comes this wave, just rolling in and it rolls over you and you're drenched by it. And just as you regain your footing, here comes another wave, wave after wave after wave after wave of grace. And God, Saved you by His grace, so that you can stand there, and day by day receive wave after wave after wave of the grace of God.

And just when you're overwhelmed, like, man, this is incredible. I've never experienced anything like this. Jesus says, there's a million more waves to come. That's crazy.

But that's what we've been saved onto. And then we've not only been saved by grace and under grace, but we have been saved for the glory. of grace. If you came to God and said, God, I am such a sinful person, even since I've become a Christian, why would you save a sinner like me?

God's reply is, I saved you, because you make my grace look really good. That makes sense to me, doesn't it? You? We make His grace look good.

And so our unworthiness and no matter how badly we stumble and sin and fail, God, that only magnifies his grace even more as we continue to walk in it. Look at this Ephesians chapter 1, verse 4, just as God chose us in Him before the foundation of the world that we would be holy and blameless. I love this before him. He didn't just say, I'm, I'm saving you and choosing you so that you can be holy and blameless.

But he's saying I'm doing this so that you would be holy and blameless in front of me. I want you in front of me, not cast aside into the lake of fire. I want you in front of me, at the center of my loving gaze, the my loving attention. God wants us in front of him.

He does not turn away. And before the foundation of the world, he chose to save us so that we would be in front. Of him and love, He predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ, literally into himself or into his embrace, according to the good pleasure of his desire. God did this because he wanted to, because it felt good to do this.

It pleasured him to do this. Verse 6, why did he do it? To the praise of the glory of His grace, which he graced on us and the beloved. God has this quality of forgiving grace.

And He came up with a plan, the perfect plan to magnify that grace. And so, all that you experience in the forgiveness of your sins, and as he lavishes his wealth upon you is all done to magnify the glory of His grace. So, if you want to experience God's grace, just realize that you've been saved by grace, you've been saved under grace, and you've been saved to the glory of grace. It's all grace, grace, grace from beginning to end.

do not ever let the devil trick you into a mentality where you have to earn one whit of God's justifying, gracious favor. It is all by grace. Another way to nurture the daily experience of the presence of the grace of Jesus with you is to be obsessed with the gospel, to be obsessed with the gospel. Paul says to the Ephesians elders in Acts 20:32, now I commend you to God, and to the word of His grace or literally the message of His grace, which is the gospel, which is continually able to build you up and to give you an inheritance among all those who are sanctified.

The gospel or the message of God's grace is daily, it is continually, he says, able to be edifying you, building you up, and giving you all that you need in your inheritance in Christ. And by the way, I've shared this with you guys before, but the Greek word that is translated builds you up, it's the word edify. And, sometimes when we think of edifying, we just think of building something, but actually in Scripture, a lot of times edifying has a transformative idea. It's edifying something from what it is into something different.

It's a transformation type of edifying. In fact, in the Genesis account, where God had put Adam into a deep sleep and then he opened up his side and took out a rib, It says in the Greek translation of the Old Testament that God edified that rib into a woman. So, God looked at that rib bone and said, this needs some serious edification. He edified it, and when he was done, it was a knockout beautiful woman.

Now, if God can do that with the rib bone, What can he do with you? And I. Through the gospel, if we are obsessed with the gospel and allowing God through the gospel to just do its work, letting the message of His grace, just living and breathing the atmosphere of that, in that atmosphere, we will catch ourselves being transformatively edified by God Himself. And we'll experience the bounty that is in our inheritance.

So, realize salvation is all of grace. Secondly, be obsessed with the gospel, just, man, be in the word every day, let God be speaking to you and lavishing his grace upon you. Continue to believe that Christ died for your sins and, and that you stand in the grace of God as a result of the death and the resurrection of Jesus. But then also, if you want to experience the ever presence, of the grace of Jesus Christ, you want to minister God's grace to others and vice versa.

Realize God has given you this grace, not as an end in itself, but so that you can then transfer that grace to other people. That's why you need to be a part of a family, a part of a church family, a body of believers, a body of a bunch of messed up believers just like you are. And you need to realize that God is going to be giving you grace. And that grace that he gives you is not intended so much for you, but he gives it to you so that you can pass that on to your brothers and sisters.

They need you. And you need to realize that God gives your brothers and sisters grace, not for them, but so that they can give that grace by way of ministering to you. And so, be a part of a church family, whether it's here at Cornerstone or some other church family, the, the important thing is that you are a part of a church family. You're committed, to those brothers and sisters in spite of your sin and their sin that is still in all of us, and you are taking the grace of God, and you're ministering that to them and allowing them to minister God's grace to you.

If you're doing that day by day, week by week, you're not going to be just saying, man, I just don't sense the grace of God is in my life. You'll be experiencing it, not just directly from the gospel, and from the Word of God and from God Himself, but you'll be experiencing that through your brothers and sisters in Christ. And then lastly, There's so much more we can say about this. But a final way to experience the grace of the Lord Jesus in your life from day to day is to pray, to come often before the throne of grace.

This is a very basic thing. If you want the grace of God to be an experiential reality in your life, then go to the throne of grace. Hebrews 4:16, Let us come boldly before the throne of grace that we may obtain mercy, find grace to help in time. of need.

So realize your salvation is all of grace from beginning to end. be consumed with the message of God's grace, which is the gospel, be preaching that to yourself, reminding yourself of those realities, every day of the forgiveness of your sins through Jesus. And the love of God for you as a result of that. And then also get involved in a body of believers, be ministering God's grace to other people, letting them do the same to you.

And then go to God. God says, hey, come to me, talk to me about anything and everything. And if you need grace, ask for it. You'll always find grace at my throne to help you in time of need.

Well, there's a second desire that is expressed by Paul and By extension, we, I would say it's the second desire of God towards us today, and that is that the love of the Father would be with us at all times, that the love of the Father would be with us. At all times. Look at this, he says, may the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. And then secondly, may the love of God, in other words, the Father be with.

You all. God's desire is that His love go with you and, and be with you at all times in times of temptation. In times of discouragement. In times of ministry?

And those times where you're rejected by other people? In the good times, the bad times, God wants his love to be your companion everywhere you go, every day, and he wants you to Enjoy the experience of that, the sensation of that. Romans 8, who shall separate us from the love of Christ? I'm convinced that neither death nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus, our Lord.

Nothing can separate us from God's love. And, and think about how comforting that is. If God loved us today, But we weren't sure he would love us tomorrow. How comforting would it be that we're loved today?

It would bring us very little comfort and we would be very insecure. In our relationship with God. We live in a society where people, when they do experience love, They don't know how to trust that, that that's going to continue with them. There's so many broken marriages in our society where a husband and wife have pledged their life.

To each other and have promised their love till death do us part, and then that love doesn't last. Imagine a woman sitting down going through her effects, who was married 10 years ago. The marriage lasted 5 years and then her husband left her. And the woman, 5 years after the divorce is reading through some of her personal effects and she finds a Valentine's card from her husband.

During the first year of their marriage, and he's telling her, I love you more than I can say. And I am excited about spending the rest of my life with you. How much comfort would it bring to that woman to read those loving sentiments. From years earlier.

Knowing that that love did not last. It would not bring any encouragement. It would only bring pain. And the glorious reality for us as Christians is that we are loved today with a love that will be with us tomorrow.

And nothing can separate us from that love. And that brings peace and comfort to our hearts. I will do a lot of stupid things between now and when I die. None of those stupid things will separate me from the love of Christ.

God is committed to loving me, not just till death do us part, but through all of eternity. And so we know that no matter what, whether we're experiencing it or sensing it at all, we know that God's love is always with us. But again, I think the spirit of what Paul is saying is that he wants us to experience the reality of that love, the sensation of that love, the heart of our Father is not just that his love be with us, but that we actually know that it's with us, and we enjoy the fact that it's with us, we experience the presence of his love.

We are blessed and moved by that.

And so let's think for just a moment about how we can nurture just an ongoing mindfulness of the love of God for us, that is with us every moment of every day. Let me give you two things to think about that will keep you mindful of God's love. Number 1, Be thinking about the fact that Christ died for you. Never move on from the cross, never stop thinking about the fact that Christ died for you.

As long as you are remembering that fact in history, and that he died for you, you will never be in doubt as to the greatness of God's love for you. Look at Romans 5:8. God demonstrates present tense, guys, present tense, not God demonstrated. He demonstrated that he loved us, at least 2000 years ago.

As to his sentiments today, who knows? But 2000 years ago, we know he loved us. No, God continuously demonstrates his love towards us at the present time. How and that while we were still sinners, Christ died in the past for us.

If you came to God and said, God, I, I just need some assurance here. Do you love me today? Do you love me today? God would say yes, and as a proof that I love you right now, as a present tense demonstration of my love for you in this moment, I point you back to that cross.

Christ died for you. That proves I love you right now. We have to be careful as Christians. In fact, I've heard, I've heard.

a Christian speaker say, if you're just feeling like, I don't really think that, I don't know if God really loves me. I've heard a Christian speaker encourage their listeners to pray to God and ask God to give them a special sign. That he loves them. And I just wonder how, how God responds to that.

After all that he has done, Sending his son to die. Someone is saying, can you just give me a sign that you love me? It's like the religious leaders, Jesus did hundreds of miracles throughout his life and ministry, raising the dead, giving sight to the blind, hearing to the deaf, and making the lame, able to walk and leap again, and doing all of these miracles. And the religious leaders near the end of Jesus' ministry come up to him and say, hey, can you give us a sign?

And Jesus had to have been thinking, duh, what have I been doing, over the last 3 years, and now you're asking me for a sign that shows who I am. What about what I have done? And guys, God has given us the ultimate sign. He, he gave.

The prized object of his affection, Jesus, over to death, so that we would be saved. And we need to learn to go back to that event and reason from that event to the reality of God's present love. We need to be able to reason like Paul, that he who spared not his own Son for us all, How will he not also with him freely be giving us right now all things? So you start with the cross, you reason from there, along with Paul, to where you're convinced of the greatness of God's present love.

The reason I know that the cross 2000 years ago proves God must love you today is because God has invested so much in you. He loves his son so much. that if he gave his son, if his son died for your salvation, God loves not only you, but he loves his son so much that he's not going to abandon you for whom his precious son died. So go to the cross, reason from the cross, and understand the greatness of God's love for you.

Another thing to contemplate on a habitual basis that will keep you mindful of the greatness of God's love is remember and contemplate the fact that God actually calls you his child. it's one thing for Christ to die for us, and God to say, hey, your sins are forgiven. I'll let you into heaven. You can be a servant.

You can live in the suburbs. but what, no relationship between us, OK? You're saved. Be happy with that.

Don't try to get close to me. If that's what God did, we would still praise Him for all of eternity, right? He didn't have to do anymore. He didn't even have to forgive us of our sins.

But God not only sent Jesus to die for our sins, but he actually adopts us into his family, makes us his sons and daughters. And we get to call him dad, father. And he calls us his children. I was reading last week about some of the theology of Islam and Muslims believe it's blasphemous for a person to call God their father.

That's too close, too intimate. And I can just imagine what they think of Romans 8, we cry Abba, Daddy, daddy, not just father, Daddy. How blasphemous that must appear to the Muslim mind. But that is exactly what the Bible teaches.

God saved us, and he makes us his sons and his daughters. And what John seems to be especially cherishing is not simply the fact that we're his sons and daughters, but that he calls us his sons and daughters. See how great a love the Father has bestowed upon us that we They should be called children of God. I'm amazed that God would call me his Son after all the things that I've done, even since being saved, as God is speaking about me to His Son, and the Spirit and to the principalities to the angelic beings, as he speaks to them about me, he refers to me as I'm his boy, I'm his son.

That's amazing to me., my dad used to do something occasionally, and I know he was joking when he did it, and I never was hurt by it because I knew he was joking, but if I was being a good boy, I was his son. If I was messing up, I would hear him speak to my mom. And tell her about her son. Putting a little distance there, and he was totally joking.

But The thing is, God has infinite reason to distance himself from us, even given our behavior since being saved. But he still refers to us as his children. He calls us his children and invites us to call him Father. See how great a love.

The Father has bestowed upon us that we would be calm. The children of God and such we actually are, but it's also even more amazing that we get to be called that, that God is willing to call us that. And so contemplate those two things. the Bible tells you that you contemplate the death of Christ and you reason from there, contemplate the fact that God calls you his son or daughter, and you will know the greatness of His love that is always with you.

Lastly, the third and final desire in this passage of God towards us is that the fellowship of the Spirit would be with us at all times. God the Father wants you in the days of this coming week, to know that the fellowship of the Spirit is always with you and for you to experience the reality of the presence of His Spirit in your life. Now that word fellowship can mean partaker of, He could be saying, the companionship of the Spirit, may the companionship of the Spirit be with you, the fellowship, the communion of the Spirit, and speaking of relationship, and not just a relationship, but the fact that we get to partake of and participate in the things of the Spirit that the Spirit wants to give to us.

So we need to have a relationship with the Spirit.

By the way, I hope you're feeling surrounded by now. Just God says, hey, my desire is I, I want. The grace of the Lord Jesus to be with you. I want the love of me, your father, to be with you.

And I want the companionship, the fellowship of my spirit to be with you. We are surrounded by the three members of the Trinity getting loved from all sides. We are never alone. The fellowship of the Spirit to be with us at all times.

We know that God's Spirit is with us, never leaves us. Once we have become a justified one. But how do we go about experiencing the reality of that fellowship? Let me just give you a few things and we'll wrap this up, guys.

First of all, let the Spirit empower you. Do you realize, see, God did not just give us a spirit, so we can just have his spirit. If you could speak to the spirit and say, why are you in me, he would not say, I don't know, but I'm here. I was sent here.

I don't know what I'm supposed to do, but I'm here if that brings any comfort to you. The Spirit was sent to dwell inside of us with a loaded agenda. And we don't even have time to get into all this stuff. But just a few things.

One of the things that the Spirit is in you to do is to empower you. To not only serve the Lord, and give you power and temptation, but also to empower you to know the things that you need to know, to empower you to know the love of God. In Ephesians 3:16, Paul prays that God would grant to you or to us according to the riches of His glory to be strengthened with power through His Spirit, and the inner man. God's Spirit is given to us so that through the Spirit, we might experience empowerment, not only to serve, not only to be victorious, not only to witness and evangelize, but also, That we would be empowered to know the love of God that Paul goes on in Ephesians 3 to talk about.

Also, if you want to experience the fellowship of the Spirit, accept and act on, however, the Spirit of God is gifting you. Realize that the Spirit gives you gifts. And he gives you those gifts so that you can serve other people, act upon that. However, the Spirit, whatever, however he gifts you, accept those gifts.

Don't be like some of the Corinthians and go, This is all I get. look at that person. I want the gifts that that person has, and because I don't have the gifts that I want, I don't even want to do anything. There are people that actually get into that funk.

and you're not fellowshipping with the Spirit when you're taking what he's given you. And you're not receiving that and acting upon it, except what he's given you, make the most of what he's given to you, be faithful with what he has given to you, and he very well may give you more, accept the gifts that the Spirit has given to you and use those gifts and ministry to other people. And as you're ministering to other people, you're realizing that all I'm doing is I'm just giving to others what the Spirit has given to me.

And so there's a companionship there.

And when you're ministering to other people, the Spirit is there. He's your constant companion and ministry to others. Also, if you want to enjoy the fellowship of the Spirit day by day, as God desires for you to, then let the Spirit pour out God's love in you. One of the most amazing works of the Spirit in our life is to pour out the love of God into our hearts, into the deepest recesses of our hearts.

This is subjective, somewhat mystical, it's hard to quantify. But Paul says, Romans 5:5, the love of God has been poured out within our hearts by the Holy Spirit who is Given to us. The Spirit of God comes into our heart with the love of God. He goes into the deepest recesses of our heart.

those places where you were hurt 20 years ago, and you slam that door, you locked that door, and you roped it off and said, what, nobody goes here anymore. I will not be hurt here again. Some of us in this room have very profound hurts, very, very deep in our hearts, where we just are terrified to ever let any human being go. what, the spirit.

One of his agendas is to be in our hearts, to be looking around, knocking, and if it's locked, Opening in any way because locks don't stop him. And coming to those spots where there has been hate and hurt and pouring out his love in the deepest recesses of our being. Wherever you have been violated, Hurt. You carry those wounds to this day.

The Spirit of God is assigned by God to go to those spots. And pour out God's love. You want to experience the fellowship of the spirit, one of the ways to do that is to realize this is one of the things that the spirit does. I will let his love go there.

Another way to enjoy the fellowship of the Spirit is to listen to his assurances. The Spirit in a way, again, somewhat mystical, subjective, he actually speaks to our spirits. The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and not just children, but if children heirs also heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, the Spirit speaks to us and says, hey, You are God's child. And if you're God's child now, you will be forever and you are an heir of eternal glory in heaven.

Lastly, guys, because we're just about out of time. This is the last slide I'm going to show you. If you want to enjoy the companionship of the Spirit, the fellowship of the Spirit, enjoy his companionship whenever you pray. I wish I can take what I know now as a 42.5 year old and insert it into the minds of anyone who is a teenager or in their 20s, and you will hear me say this, and you'll go, yeah, that's true.

You will nod politely, but you probably won't get it. You are dangerously weak. And you probably don't know that right now, and you can get by OK on your own strength. But as you age and as life gets more complicated, and you get married, and you have trouble in this life as the scripture promises, and then you have children who are born depraved sinners and have needs and much beauty in them, but just there's a need for wisdom and, and for grace and, and then everything else in life that you are dealing with, you will come to a point where you realize, that you don't have the strength that you need.

When you realize that, you will realize that you must have God's strength. You will then realize you need to pray more. But when you pray more, you will realize I am too weak to even pray. many of my prayers.

Began with the words lately, God. I am an ignorant. Yeah. And all about me are things that require wisdom and answers.

That I don't have, I must have your wisdom and your strength. So, you will pray more, but as you pray, You'll be at a loss as to what to ask for. It's in those moments where, You can enjoy the companionship and the company of the Spirit of God who prays with you. Romans 8.

In the same way the spirit helps our weaknesses. For we do not know how to pray. as we should. But the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words.

The spirit is not some dispassionate. person that's there listening to our prayers and saying, yeah, Lord, take care of that. The Spirit is very passionately concerned, and the Spirit is able to express those needs and requests that we are too unwise and too weak to even know how to express. And I'm finding myself not only praying more, OK.

But even when I pray, relying on the spirit's prayers, More than ever. And at times, Just pausing and saying, God, right now, just listen to your spirit as he prays, because I don't know what to ask for. So, guys, the list can go on and on of ministries of the Holy Spirit in our life. But wrapping all this up, God in heaven, who has saved me.

What are your three wishes with regard to me? God was saved. I desire that the grace of the Lord Jesus will be with you always. I desire that my love for you will be with you always.

I desire that the fellowship, the companionship of my spirit would always be with you. Even in your prayer closet. Everywhere, all the time. Let us feel the heart of God this morning.

Let us feel surrounded by His love and grace and his company. These are ours for the taking, ours for the enjoying, and God gives them to us. why? Because it pleasures Him to give us these things.