January 21, 2018_Speak with the Spirit (1Corinthians 14:1-25)

Sermon Outline

God
is spirit.
He created man and increased him
so that man filled the earth and language was developed (Gen 1:28-30).
Man’s language is speech, a sound (Gen 11:1).
However, the word of God is spirit and life (Jn 6:63).
Man’s spirit is also spirit and life.
However, the word of God is a life-giving spirit
whereas man’s spirit is a living spirit (1 Co 15:45).
Human speech is sound used for communication
but it cannot speak of the matters of the spirit
nor can man understand the mysteries the spirit utters (1 Co 2:11).
Yet the spirit also utters its mysteries to God
and God hears them (1 Co 14:2).
God hears of the spirit’s affairs
which only the spirit knows.
◌ The gift of tongues given by God is not human speech
but the spirit’s words
which only God understands.
◌ When we lived as sinners, our spirits were mute.
But after we received the forgiveness of sins,
our spirits were liberated.
Speaking in tongues is the spirit’s fervent prayer.
◌ Prophecy is about hope;
it is God’s words.
The gospel is the spiritual word.
※ Whoever speaks in a tongue, speaks to God.
We must pray with the mind and with the spirit.

Semuon’s Letter

My beloved Sungrak people, I love you.

I am fighting like Elijah against 850 of the prophets of Baal and the false prophets, and the fight is lonesome and solitary. Fortunately, there are those who love the church, and love and support the overseer, and they give me strength. Elijah only made this one request: ‘Let them know that you are the true God and that I am your servant’.

As time goes by, this profitless fight is like a fight in the mud, and it is only getting longer. However, I am old and I do not know how long the Lord will sustain me. But until that day, I will fight strongly and will have victory.

I was born in a small village along a deprived coastline, and I have experienced frightening war. But God chose an ignorant and useless boy like me, and at a young age I became the Lord’s servant and he used in me. From that time on I have received only the word of wisdom by the Spirit and the word of knowledge by the Spirit and the word of power by the Spirit and faith by the Spirit and I have continued this spiritual life. The Lord shed his blood for a sinner like me, and I have stored the love and grace of the Lord Jesus Christ up in my body. I have ran my whole life to save souls like my own.

I have known that if for one moment I do not act by the Holy Spirit, I cannot last at all. Therefore, like a man who is drunk by the Holy Spirit all day and night, I have maintained its fullness. I am not a righteous man. Nor am I a perfect man. But I am a servant who, no lesser than anyone, has lived by trusting in the precious blood of Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit.

I do not live by the righteousness of my conscience but I live by trusting in the righteousness of the Holy Spirit. I have no reply to anyone who accuses me as a sinner. I am a man who only loves the Lord Jesus. Therefore, the Lord clothes me with Jesus, and so that I live by Jesus, he works by his life and truth in me, and he covers my naked body with Jesus. I have received justification only by Jesus’ righteousness, and with all my dying strength I am determined to participate in the Lord’s suffering.

What I ask of our saints, who love the Lord’s body (which is the Church), is that you would continue to pray more for me. The Lord has promised that where two or three gather to pray at one place, the Lord will be with them. Elijah, in a land where there was a drought and for 3 years and 6 months the rain did not come, he prayed for rain and it finally came pouring.

My whole life I have worked until my prayers are answered and I have overcome. By the power of prayer, Joshua stopped the sun and the moon. Moses made the water come out of the rock and opened and closed the sea. In Mark’s attic, around 120 people gathered to devote themselves to prayer and on the day of Pentecost they received great power by the Holy Spirit.

The Lord has commanded: ‘Call out! Urgently call out!’ There is a great difference between the one who prays and the one who does not pray. I ask that you all pray for me. I plead that you would pray greatly for the church. Thank you. There is certainly a reply to the prayer of faith.