So good to have the Lord here.
If the doctrines I preach are not true, I'm a lost man. And my life becomes an agonizing
disappointment. And my death, a horrible calamity. I know the Gospel's true. Because
I've tried and proved its power. I know it's inside and outside.
of this Gospel. And I'm as sure of the Gospel
of God's sovereign and free grace as I am my own existence. I'm
past compromising, past talking about it. It's amazing grace,
how sweet to sound. I've been hurt so bad, and you
have too. Anybody in here been hurt? Then
it looks like every hand went up. And truthfully so. Then you
need a comforter. Let's begin with John 14, verse
16. And I will pray the Father, and
He shall give you another comforter. Well, first of all, Jesus is
the first comforter. But Jesus is about to go away.
And it's not going to be good for you to be left down here
by yourself. So, it says, I'm not going to leave you orphans.
I will send you another Comforter that He may abide with you forever. I'm going to send you a Comforter
that's going to be with you as long as you live. Isn't that
something? I hope you get it today. And
verse 17 says, even the Spirit of truth whom the world cannot
receive, because it seeth Him not, neither knoweth Him. Do you know the Spirit of God?
Do you have a sense of the Spirit of God? But ye know Him. You know Him. He's already been
here with us. He's already made Himself manifest. The Spirit of God, the Comforter,
He dwelleth in you and shall be in you. Verse 25, These things
have I spoken unto you, being yet present with you. But the
Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, that's King James Version,
Spirit, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name,
He shall teach you. All of us need to be taught.
He shall teach you all things. Oh, how wonderful it is to be
taught by the Spirit of God and bring all things to your remembrance,
whatever I have said unto you. Verse 28 says, I go away and
come again unto you. In Romans 1 and verse 28 through
32, I won't take time to read it, but you will find there the
blacklist of all of the mess that's going on in the world
today. Do you know this is a messed
up world? That's why you're messed up. The reason you need a comforter
is because sin has messed you up and messed me up. Did you
know that 75 to 80 percent of human trafficking is for sex? Messed up world. Did you know
that there are more human slaves in the world today than ever
before in the history of the world? Messed up world. Did you
know that there are an estimated 27 million adults and 13 million
children around the world who are victims of human trafficking?
Did you know that human trafficking not only involves sex and labor,
but people are also bought for organ harvesting? That means
people are bought, surgeries performed, and their kidneys
are taken, or their heart is taken. That's going on in our
world. You know what's going on. These
aren't foreign things to you that I'm talking about today. 71% of children who have been sold
show suicidal tendencies. Did you know that the Taliban
buys children as young as seven years old to act as suicide bombers? Did you know that over the past
30 years, over 30 million children have been sexually exploited
through human trafficking? This world's messed up. And I
guarantee you, I'm not talking about Afghanistan. I'm talking
about Pontiac. I'm talking about you, and you
know it's true. Many in this auditorium have experienced some
of the things that I have just mentioned. It's not a far off.
It's here. And you know what you need? You
need a comforter. You need a comforter. I'll talk
a little later about, you know why you use drugs? Because your
greatest need is comfort. Do you know that God in the Holy
Spirit has met your greatest need? You don't need crack. Crack will never comfort you.
Heroin will never comfort you. Illicit sex will never comfort
you. It will never satisfy you. But
the Comforter has come. There is no reason for the little
child of God to suffer as He does in this life. Well, Jesus
saved my soul. I know. But right now, Jesus
is concerned about your life. Having a little heaven on the
way to heaven. The devil wants you to be miserable.
And the only way he can make you miserable is for you to lack
an understanding that a Comforter has come. And he really, truly
gives comfort. The Apostle Paul in the Corinthian
letters said, The God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ is the
God of all comfort. Jesus said, I'm going away. I'm
a comfort to you. I'm the consolation of Israel.
But since I'm going away, you're going to need someone else here.
I'm not going to leave you like little orphan kids. where you
get saved and then you're left all alone to figure it out. Why
was I abused? Why was I sexually abused? Why
was I molested? Why didn't my parents love me?
Why, why, why? You can have a little heaven
on the way to heaven being a child of God. There is no reason for
this place not to be happy today as a Christian. And God says
to the preacher, God doesn't say this to the preacher. God
doesn't say to the preacher, beat my kids up and abuse them. And when they leave the house
of God, let them leave bloody and bleeding. Thank you for stepping
all over my toes. God has brought you here for
me to comfort you through the preaching of the Word of God.
You must get comfort today because tomorrow you're going back out
there in that world. Am I right about that? And that
world doesn't give two cents about you. God promises to comfort
His kids. And He comforts us with the paraclete.
The Greek means to come alongside. Somebody you can lean on. Somebody
that's your defender. Somebody that really takes your
side. Someone that holds you up and
hugs you tight. Someone that reveals the love
of God to you. The paraclete. His nature is
pure. He's called the Holy Spirit.
He's immaterial in existence. I've been in one church where
the preacher was making fun. I was visiting a guest there.
But, oh, preachers talk about the Holy Spirit. And he looked
under the pew and, you know, acted like a fool himself, fool
that he was. So I don't see the Spirit. You don't see the Spirit. But
I'll tell you this, when the wind blows, you see the effects.
Have you ever seen the wind? How do you know there's a wind? So is everyone that is born of
the Spirit of God. The paraclete, the comforter. It's a fitting title. Called
to come alongside. Anybody need somebody to come
alongside of them? Someone to encourage. Someone
to strengthen. Someone to instruct. What's your
greatest need? I can tell you this, child of
God, your greatest need is to be comforted. And I pray God
will grant that today. Think about this. Think about
what a mess it would be without the Comforter. I'm talking to
you Christians. You know what the Apostle Paul
said? What I want to do, I don't do. What I hate, that do I. Oh, wretched man that I am! What
if you had to stay there thinking like that all the time? That
is at the end of Romans 7. At the beginning of Romans 8
and verse 1, Paul says, right after saying, O wretched man
that I am, he said, But there is therefore now no condemnation
to those that are in Christ Jesus. The Comforter tells us that.
You've been living with things for years and years and years.
You have that black secret on the inside. And the devil barks
at you and growls at you and reminds you. And then there's
always mom and dad. And there's always your best
friend that reminds you. I knew you when you were a drug
addict. I knew when you were out there. But the comforter
comes and says, it's all gone. It's all been taken care of.
There's no condemnation to those that are in Christ Jesus. There's
only one physician. that can heal our pain. What
if we had to go through life this way? In my flesh dwells
no good thing. And we know that. When you got
saved, you didn't get any better. Your flesh didn't get gooder.
In fact, I found this out. I'm headed towards 70 now. I
found out this. My flesh doesn't get better.
It gets worse. I know more now at close to 70
than I knew when I was 70. I know more about sin. I've thought
more about it. What if you had to live with
that every day of your life? And then there's things I've
done in this life that are not so hot, that I would have to
live with, thinking I'm going to have to face God with those
things. Oh, He comforts us. Let me tell you something that's
really comforting. You know this paraclete, this Holy Spirit,
he's the hound of heaven. And God the Father one day said
to God the Holy Spirit, And the Holy Spirit came after
you. You know, we say this here all
the time. You didn't find God. He wasn't lost. Oh, I found the
Lord. I'm so proud of myself. The Lord
has never been lost. He had to send the hound dog
of heaven after you. And He got on your trail, and
it wasn't a pleasant smell. And he went all the way down
to Lodibar to find a dead dog like you and me. Sniffed you out. Found you down there in your
filth. Think about this. Oh, what a wonder that Jesus
found me. Out in the darkness, no light could I see. He put
His great arm under, and wonder of wonders, He saved even me."
Down there in Lodibar, down there in the hood, hiding out in the
crack house, shooting up. And then some of you, the hound
of heaven had to go to a steeple house to find you, because you
were sitting in there all pious, glad that you had never been
to the hood or ever used drugs, and you were as lost as a goose.
On your way to hell in the pew. In the choir law, self-righteous,
you'd never go over to Pontiac with those homeless people. He tracked you down. He fetched
you out. Fetch him out of Lodibar. Poor
Mephibosheth. He couldn't even walk. Remember,
both his legs had been broke in the fall. Oh, you had a fall
too. You came out of the womb with
broken legs. If He doesn't come to you...
I love that song. Oh, He came to me. He came to
me when I could not come to Him. He came to me. You were Adam
and Eve. You didn't always love Jesus.
If you've always loved Jesus, that's too long. You were hiding in the bushes.
And God came walking. And look what He found. Not too
long ago, I was walking along the beach in Florida and I found
a $20 bill. Look what I found! God didn't go like that over
you. Look what a mess! Lodibar, the Hound of Heaven. sought you, came to your hood,
came to where you are. And then when He got there, you
were dead. Dead in sins and trespasses. Inactive toward God. You didn't
have a will that was free to serve God. You had a will that
was enslaved to your nature. You had a hog's nature. You loved
a hog pen. You loved the mire in order for
you to get saved. God's got to give you a new nature.
He's got to born you again. Oh, I just remember the old time
and place where it happened. Down on the front row on the
mourner's bench. You don't know when you were
born again. Nobody knows when they were born again. You may
remember the first time you desired to know Christ. You may remember
hungering and thirsting after Christ, but by that time, you'd
already been born of the Spirit of God. He'd already given you
life. You were dead and inactive until
He said, live. You were in the valley of dry
bones. You were the babe in the open field, dead and without
hope, laying in your own blood. And then He came to you and said,
live. You know why you're here wanting
to serve God today? Because the Comforter came. The
Spirit of God came and regenerated you. Isn't that a comforting
thought? He put shoes on your feet and a robe on your back
and a wedding ring on your finger and said, I'll never leave you.
I'm going to always be here. Oh, you get shaky, don't you,
coming out of the hood. You get shaky sometimes. You
know, I've heard some of you talk about drugs. You say things
like this. You know, I had one of those
dreams. I can hear it calling me. Well, hear this. I can hear
the Spirit of God calling me. He's got a louder voice than
Crack. Crack is no match. No match. Another way that the
paraclete is a comforter is His presence. He indwells us. Sometimes,
I've said this to Miss Bam, sometimes I feel so alone. And she always
says to me, How could you feel alone? How could you? But you know what it is to feel
alone sometimes? Just to feel alone. Sometimes I think about
her dying or passing away and I think, I'd be alone. But I'm
never alone. No! Never alone! Because the
Comforter is here. The Comforter is coming. He indwells me. Greater is He
that's in you. than he that's in the world.
Sometimes I feel my own natural deadness. You know, you've heard
me tell the story about a man that got up one Sunday morning
and he said, I'm not going to church, to his wife. I said,
but you've got to go to church. He said, I'm not going. Give
me one good reason why I should go. Because you're the pastor. Sometimes you don't feel like
going. See, I'm not required to bring
down the Holy Spirit. He's already in me. And you know,
really, I really get activated when I hear, Jesus loves me,
this I know. Or when I hear without Him, something
inside of me starts going on that's hard to explain outside
of this. He's in me. He dwells in me. The Spirit of God dwells in me. He has come down here and He's
not going back. What if the Spirit of God should
leave me? He said, I'm going to be with you always. Wherever
you go, He goes. Uh-oh. Haven't we taken Him some places
He probably didn't want to go? But I'm glad He didn't leave
us in there by ourselves. Oh, He'll go in the bar with
you. He'll go. I know some of you are gasping right now, all
you church people. He didn't actually say that,
did he? Yep. How many here, he's gone in the crack house with
you? Just raise your hand. Look at that. At least 40 of
you. That's what I mean. You see, we're an honest church
here. 41. We're an honest church here. We're not playing the Sunday
morning religion. My God is real. He's in my blood. Satan may roar
at you. The lusts of the flesh may rebel
and temptations of this world may assail you. But the Holy
Spirit is resident in you. He lives in you. So all is well. And He's not going to leave you
until you're made perfect. Think of what it means to have
His presence in the church. I thought about this last night,
hearing the Gospel with the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven.
He's the paraclete. He's the comforter. He's the
advocate. Think about Him being here today.
Just think about it. He speaks for us. He's our advocate. The church without Him is a mess. Really, the church without Him
is an imposter church of Jesus Christ. There's nothing going
to happen here without Him. You can just count on Him. You
can have all the fancy meetings you want to have. But nothing's
going to happen without the paraclete, the comforter, the Holy Spirit. I was thinking last night about
how for 34 years, how much he's been this church's advocate.
So much opposition, so much criticism. This preacher has been condemned
as unlearned and vulgar in the pulpit, just a passing fancy. I'm the non-intellectual preacher
in Pontiac. I'm the guy who only had one
message. Jesus and Him crucified. Ten
years ago, we were raided and threatened with being arrested.
But you know what? For 34 years, this church has
never been without an audience. From our littleness to where
we are now, and where we're about to be, and where we're headed.
The presence of the Lord has been here with us. We have not
lacked conversions. People have been converted here.
Though many times we don't have any kind of invitation or ask
people to come up front. People are converted. It is my
pleasure to listen to testimonies when the news media come. And
it was my pleasure this week to hear some of you give your
testimony live on television. And how you gave God the glory.
and how you gave Him the praise and the honor. That's because
of the Paraclete, the Comforter down here who has quickened you.
He's our Defender. He's our Defender. He'll avenge
His own cause. Jesus said, He, the Paraclete,
shall glorify Me. You know, the Holy Spirit gets
excited too when I preach Christ. You get excited. I get excited.
The whole church gets excited. The angels in heaven get excited.
What do you think the angels are doing right now? Do you know? I know this is not going to sound
right, but the devil hates to hear me preach and the angels
love to hear me preach. You know why? Because they're
the folks up there that are saying worthy is the Lamb. And that's
what I'm saying too. And when I say worthy is the
Lamb gets them excited up there and all of heaven gets excited.
And then when a sinner comes to Christ and to know Christ,
there's hallelujah in heaven over one sinner. You think about
this. One crackhead that gets saved
and born again, washed in the blood of Christ. Oh, heaven goes
crazy. You know, I know some of you
don't think you're much, but heaven went nuts when God the
Holy Spirit regenerated you. There was shouting up there.
We have a defender, and that's good to know. Real quick, the
paraclete is a comforter. He's an advocate with us. He
leads us into comfort, especially before the judgment seat of our
own conscience. You know, there are times when
the Spirit of God will lead you to tell your own conscience.
When that black dog barks, tell him to shut up and go to hell. There is therefore no condemnation
to those that are in Christ Jesus. And we know that all things work
together for good to them that love the Lord, to them who are
the called according to His purpose. For whom He did foreknow, He
also did predestinate. Whom He predestinated, them He
also called. Whom He called, them He also
justified. Whom He justified, them He also
glorified. Who shall lay anything to the
charge of God's elect? I am persuaded that neither life,
nor death, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present,
nor things to come, nor any other creature shall be able to separate
us from the love of God. You ought to stand on your feet
and shout right now. You ought to stand on your feet
and clap right now. You're going to make it!