Hey this is Pastor John Ryan Cantu from PNEUMA Church in Houston, Texas.

Thank you for listening to the message today.

I hope that it blesses you and all those who are. that you share it with.

God bless you.

Um we have baptisms and I want to get to all of that, but There is a word that has been stirring on my spirit for several months.

And I I feel like it's time to deliver this word.

It's on a very narrow focused topic.

And um I feel like, you know, as our church has been growing, not just in numbers, but in spirit, you know, it's time to deliver this teaching.

This is what that'll be today.

We're a Pentecostal church.

Amen.

Pentecostal any Pentecostals in here?

Amen.

What does that mean?

Does it mean we're just loud?

Does it mean we just like worship music?

Like what is what does it mean to be a Pentecostal?

First of all, it doesn't mean that we don't it doesn't mean that we're like the real Christians.

It doesn't mean that we don't consider like our Baptists and our Presbyterians and our Anglicans and our Eastern Orthodox.

It doesn't mean that we don't consider them Christian.

They're Christian as well.

A denomination is not what saves us.

Jesus is who saves us, right?

And so Pentecostalism is simply a movement within the Christian church, the fastest-growing movement, by the way, in the Christian church.

And it means that we believe in the power of the Holy Spirit.

We believe that he is alive, that he is active in the church, that he's working in and through the church today by granting us spiritual gifts. to be used for the edification of believers.

It means that we believe in the supernatural power of God.

That God not only can heal, but he still heals.

God not only can do miracles, he still does miracles.

And this is what it means for us to be moved, led, and empowered by the Holy Spirit.

It's why we're called pneuma.

Pneuma is the Greek word meaning wind.

It is often used of the Holy Spirit.

It was the the pneuma.

It was the wind.

That blue in the upper room where the disciples were to receive the power to take the gospel to all the nations.

This wasn't new revelation.

This was the power to declare what had already been revealed.

Jesus says to his disciples, When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all truth, for he will not speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears, he will speak.

That means that the spirit of truth, the Holy Spirit, is in alignment with the Father and with the Son.

You hear me?

One without the other is not God, that's something else.

And so as Pentecostals, we embrace the Holy Spirit supernatural activity in the church today. for the purpose of edifying the saints, for the purpose of restoring us to the Holy Father.

That's who we are.

That's who what what we believe.

We're never going to stop believing that because Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there's freedom.

And we've seen this freedom.

We've seen people be set free in the Spirit of God.

We've seen people get healed and transformed.

Man, we We saw a blind man have his sight restored, man.

We've seen some things.

And so I'm not going to stop embracing the power of the Holy Spirit.

Now, can things get weird sometimes?

You know it.

You've been in Pen You've been in the same Pentecostal churches I've been in.

Things can get weird, but it's not it's not the spirit that's weird.

It's people who are weird.

It's people who do weird things in the name of God.

It's people who throw their jackets at you to make you fall.

People give you weird prophetic utterances.

It's not the spirit.

But it's often done through spirit-filled people.

And that's the tension.

And if you're not paying attention this morning, I want you to pay attention Because this is something for the Pentecostal church, the Spirit-infused, the powerful church of God.

That are Pentecostals.

And in the book of Acts, the Spirit was poured out upon all flesh as a fulfillment of what the prophet Joel declared.

And that outpouring gave all the saints, somebody say all the saints, all the saints, this power, this access.

To the Holy Spirit's power, which is awesome.

But at the same time, think about that for a second.

All believers have access to the Holy Spirit's empowerment Does that not make you a little bit nervous?

You wouldn't trust some Christians with your car You wouldn't trust some Christians to babysit your kids.

And yet, these people have been granted access to the Holy Spirit's power.

There there's a there's a really good movie that my dad used to uh quote from all the time when he would preach.

It's from the original Spider-Man.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

None of this Tom Holland stuff Toby Maguire, you know?

When when Uncle Ben was still relevant.

Does Gen Z even know who Uncle Ben is?

Okay Uncle Ben and the original Spider-Man, Uncle Ben, he gives the the these these final party words to his nephew, Peter Parker.

Um that he would let later use as Spider-Man.

Do you know where I'm going?

He says, with great power comes great responsibility.

With great power comes great responsibility.

Now we're not Spider-Man, but we're better than Spider-Man.

We are spirit-filled Holy Ghost believers, man.

We have got access.

To the power of the Holy Spirit.

This is not just for the apostles, it's not just for preachers or pastors or evangelists, it's for all believers.

And because this power is so great, we have a responsibility to use it correctly.

Believe it or not, there are more people walking around with spiritual gifts than with spiritual fruit.

Because everybody wants the gifts.

Everybody wants the platform, the recognition, the credit, the calling, the work that fulfills you.

Only a few are actively searching for the fruit.

And so because we've got a lot of people, a lot of Christians walking around with gifts and no fruit What was meant to give us power, listen, what was meant to give us power to edify believers, we've used to divide believers.

We've used as spiritual abuse.

We've used as intimidation.

We've used as manipulation that God is saying something that He's never said.

We've used it as a form to confuse the saints.

And people, not the spirit, have done an incredible damage to this incredible gift that Jesus Christ left us with.

And so the apostle Paul he addresses this issue in 1 Thessalonians, chapter 5, if you would turn there.

Chapter 5, 1 Thessalonians 19 through 22.

This is going to be our text.

It's only three short verses, but listen, I don't want you to read it as Pentecostals.

I want you to read it as students of Scripture.

Okay?

That's not to say that Pentecostalism isn't biblical.

It absolutely is, but scripture allows what we believe about Pentecostalism to be affirmed as well as refined.

And sometimes we need what we believe to be refined.

So if you would stand with me real quick, it's very short.

1 Thessalonians 5, 19 through 22.

It says, do not quench the spirit, do not despise prophecies, but test everything, hold fast what is good, abstain from every form of evil.

Can we say that one more time since it's so short together?

Do not quench the spirit.

Do not despise prophecies, but test everything, hold fast what is good, and abstain from every form.

Of evil, you can you can take your seat.

I entitled the sermon this morning, Battle of the Spirits Battle the spirits.

And I don't want this like to be a confusing title because the spirits that we need to battle sometimes are not necessarily demonic spirits.

They're just not accurate spirits.

You know what I mean?

Like they they might come from a good place.

They might come from a place that we believe is godly, but somehow it still misses the mark.

This is really how we can describe discernment.

Charles Spurgeon is attributed with saying that discernment is not knowing right from wrong, it's knowing right from almost right.

That's the battle.

That's the tension.

And that can can leave doors open that bring confusion to the church, that bring division to the church, all of which hinder and slow down. the movement of the Holy Spirit in the life of the church.

The church of Thessalonica, this was a very young church.

Literally they were probably about a few months old.

And Acts chapter 17 records the founding by the Apostle Paul.

There he's preaching in the synagogues.

And the Bible says that many of the Thessalonians they receive the gospel.

They receive Jesus.

But others are. offended and and and and consider the message blasphemous and so they form a mob leading Paul to leave the city abruptly for safety reasons but when he leaves He's left with this burning desire for the Thessalonian church.

This this infant group of Christians Who he had to leave and are left without a pastor and need instruction because there's a lot of ravenous wolves bringing confusion to the saints.

And they need encouragement.

And so in this letter, as well as 2 Thessalonians, he addresses issues that are they're causing confusion in the church.

There's people that are trying to disqualify Paul.

They're saying that Paul isn't really uh from the from the Lord.

He wasn't commissioned by Jesus, and they're trying to disqualify him.

He's He's he's uh addressing some issues of of confusion about the day of the Lord, and some people are saying that the day of the Lord has already come, and some people are s they've stopped working uh because they're like, well, Jesus is he already came, so uh we just Does not do anything.

And there's a lot of confusion going on that of things that are not correct.

And so by the time he gets to the end of this first letter, he gives them this very relevant advice that in the midst of all this confusion That the church is experiencing, he says, don't quench the spirit.

Don't despise prophecies Test everything.

So there's there's tension.

There's a tension of two extremes in this verse that I want to talk about real quickly, and maybe you identify with one of them.

Tension number one, or extreme number one, is you quench the spirit.

Maybe Maybe you say, man, there's too many people claiming to speak of the spirit, but I'm not really sure what's of the spirit, what's not.

There's too much going on that I don't understand.

There's too much going on that makes me feel uncomfortable.

None of this really makes sense.

Maybe none of this is the spirit.

Maybe you've gotten there before.

Maybe you've walked into some Pentecostal churches or a charismatic church, and you're like, what the heck are they doing in here?

And you said, you know what, I'm done listening to these so-called prophets.

I'm I'm done listening to these people who always have a dream they need to share.

I'm done listening to these people who always feel like God is telling them something.

They sound weird when they speak in tongues They're always saying, God show me this, God show me that.

I'm not, you know what, I'm done listening to them.

Paul says, hey, don't quench the spirit.

Don't despise the prophetic gift from the spirit.

Don't throw out the baby with the bathwater.

Because then how are you going to live a spirit-filled life?

We don't need less of the spirit.

We need more of the spirit.

Don't quench the spirit.

To quench the spirit means to extinguish it.

Means to put out its fire.

And we don't need less fire in churches.

We need more fire in churches.

We need more preachers who are filled with the power of the Holy Spirit.

We need more church members who are moved, led, and empowered, not by their emotions, but by the spirit.

We need more people who are baptized in the spirit.

We need people who know how to flow and minister and worship in spirit and in truth.

Don't quench the spirit.

We don't need dry churches.

We don't need dry church services.

And we don't need Christians who are so skeptical about anything being from God that they never actually see the glory of God in their life.

You know what I'm saying?

You gotten maybe you gotten to that point where everything good that happens is just a coincidence, and you never give God credit.

Because you've extinguished the spirit in your life.

Well, Pastor, what do I do?

I've been let down before.

I've been led down the wrong path, and I believe people That I thought were speaking from the Spirit.

I've been told to wait for my marriage and then it ended anyway.

I've been told that He's the one, only for Him to cheat on me and leave me five years later.

I've been told to wait for the baby that was coming.

The baby never came.

I was told to quit my job because something better is coming.

It's been 10 years and I'm still broke.

And I wish I had that job that I left.

What am I supposed to do?

So this verse speaks to that one extreme of people who have either been hurt or led the wrong way.

And you're done and you're tired of the spiritual manufacturing that you've actually suppressed anything that could be the Holy Spirit.

If that's you today, man, I'm asking you to come back, bro.

Come back, open up your heart, soften your heart.

That was my prayer this morning.

God, soften the hearts that have hardened themselves to your spirit.

Come back.

Only be careful not to equate people with the spirit.

Because people are emotional.

People are careless.

People have their own opinions about spiritual matter.

People are clumsy with the word of God.

People are irresponsible with their gifting.

People feel pressure.

To give spiritual wisdom when they've got nothing from the spirit to say.

But it doesn't mean that the spirit is not at work in them and through them.

It just means that we have a responsibility to discern.

The answer to spiritual confusion is not less Holy Spirit.

It's more Holy Spirit.

Don't quench the Spirit.

Don't quench the spirit.

When you come in here and the spirit of God is moving, when you come in here and you feel something, when you when you come in here and you see something that you don't you don't understand, ask God, Lord, what are you doing?

What are you doing?

Teach me.

What are you doing?

I want to be sensitive to what you're doing.

Don't quench the spirit.

Don't say this is not God.

Don't say I gotta leave.

Be sensitive to the Holy Spirit.

That's extreme number one.

Extreme number two is not discerning at all.

So this other group that Paul is speaking to is a group who might take everything that sounds spiritual as authentic.

So you got one group that is totally skeptical about everything, and then you got another group that is totally gullible about everything.

We got a lot of gullible Christians in the church.

Who take anything that sounds good, anything that sounds spiritual, or anything that is from a trusted source, and they equate it with God's truth for their life.

I've said this before, man.

Just because it sounds spiritual doesn't mean it's biblical.

So Paul says you have to test these things.

You've got to pray on these things.

Many of you, every week, man, you you uh for some reason you listen to me preach.

And you continue to do so because you've at least got a little bit of trust in what I'm saying.

It's it's easy to receive it's easy to receive the word when you're receiving it from somebody that you trust.

So I tell people all the time, man, but before you deliver a word to somebody, you might have to build some trust.

Otherwise, they might not receive it.

By the way, this was a major test in receiving the canon of scripture.

The early church, they didn't have this Bible that we have.

They didn't have the 66 books.

What they had were so many different uh uh uh pieces of scriptures.

That claimed to be word of God.

And that was why it was causing so much confusion.

And if you read the letters of Paul, that's why he had to address so much of false teachings.

Because people would receive these words of people who claim to be speaking from God and it was causing division in the church.

And so the early church had to do something, they had to use this metric called apostolic authority.

Meaning that if something that was received wasn't from a trusted source like an apostle.

It didn't carry weight.

You have to build some trust sometimes before delivering a word.

But even then, somebody say even then.

Just because somebody's built trust with you doesn't mean they can't be wrong.

I hear this all the time.

Well, God's used him plenty of times before.

He obviously must be speaking truth.

Men of God can be wrong.

So so so you're listening to me.

Many of you, many people ask for pastoral advice, and what do I do about this and what do I think about that?

And every time I get behind the pulpit, man, I have to I have to pray, Lord be my voice.

I don't want to speak.

I don't want to speak on my own authority, Lord.

Every time I get in my office and I and I'm meeting with somebody who needs some type of counseling, I say, Lord, I don't got the wisdom, but you have it.

Give it to me so that I can impart it on them.

I don't know their life like you do, my God.

Give me some type of revelation so that I can speak into their life because I don't want to I don't want to abuse your word I don't want to misuse your your word.

I don't want to miss the mark when I'm giving uh uh somebody uh some type of advice that is gonna affect them somehow.

I don't want to do that, Lord.

So give me wisdom.

And even in emotional state, man, sometimes little Ryan Sita will come out, and I'll speak on my own authority, and I'll speak on my own wisdom.

So yes, even my words, test them.

Test my words.

Test the words of the people that you let into your ears.

Test that podcaster.

Test test the words of the author that you're reading.

Test the words of your leaders and your mentors.

Test the word of today, to today's most trusted voices in Christianity.

Test the dream.

Because not every dream is divine.

Test the confirmation.

Because it might not be a confirmation, it might be a coincidence.

Test it.

You might be getting too excited before calling something confirmation because that's what you want it to be a confirmation.

Test it.

Tests everything Paul says.

We have gotten lazy with the Spirit of God.

And that's where the enemy finds his footing.

It's in the laziness of Christians who don't discern You just spitting things saying this is from the Lord.

God showed me this.

God showed me that.

You need to do this.

You need to do that.

Shut up.

And let the Spirit of God speak before you speak out of an emotional or out of your own agenda.

Why is this so important?

Because it's the word of God.

That's why.

You think this thing is you you think this is a toy This is a double-edged sword.

We have a responsibility when we carry this.

We have a responsibility when we deliver this.

Don't play with this.

Because you have it.

You have it.

And you know what?

Don't let people make you feel less spiritual when you say, I gotta pray about it.

Don't let them make you feel less spiritual when you say I gotta process this in my spirit.

I gotta take this to God.

You are not let you are not less spiritual by discerning.

You are more spiritual by discerning.

Forgive me if the word that you give me doesn't excite me right away.

Forgive me if I don't drop everything that I that I that I have on my plate to go and do the thing that you told me to do right now.

Forgive me.

I have a duty to my God to go to him with every word that has been that is being received by somebody else or delivered by somebody else.

Now, let me say this.

If I'm reading the word and I'm saying like Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life, and you're like, well, let me pray about that.

No.

But when we're dealing with the abstract, when we're dealing with the uncertainty, when we're dealing with the dissonance and the many voices in the room.

Or we're dealing with when we're man, you you go on social media, one pastor saying this and one pastor saying that.

What what what the heck Doesn't that frustrate you?

That frustrates me that we all have the same spirit, but we have different things that we're saying.

God still speaks Rema, divine word, now word And we have to receive it in the spirit.

Test everything.

Why is this message so important?

Why has this been stirring on my spirit?

Because the enemy is the author of confusion.

He's the author of lies.

And you know what?

His work is most evident in the church more than it is in the world The enemy doesn't need to manage sin.

The world's already lost.

Sin is already taken over.

So the enemy is focused on what hasn't been destroyed.

He wants to take God's glory.

He wants to take what is holy and what is pure, and he wants to contaminate it.

And he does this through people.

He does this through people.

He uses some people who are pure evil.

Like the Judas Iscariots.

These might be the people who intend on causing harm to the church.

They're into witchcraft, they're into perversion, and they have an agenda other than trying to rid themselves of sin.

Those people, when they're identified, need to be cast out of the church.

If that's anybody here, if you're here with the purpose of harming your brothers or harming your sisters, you've got no intention on repenting.

You've got no intention on getting closer to God.

You've got no business here because this is what this is for.

It's not unloving to say it.

It's protective to say it.

If you are in a witchcraft, perversion, get out of here, man.

And I'm so grateful that we have a praying church.

I'm so grateful for my brother, for Pastor Brandon, who's always alert and always ready and always praying.

But you know what?

More often than that, because I feel like I feel like we're always keeping our eyes open to those that are manipulative, to those that are uh with another agenda to those that are witches.

We're always keeping our eyes open to that.

But you know what?

More often than that, the enemy uses situations in the church.

To stir up the people in the church.

And if you ask me, that's even more evil.

Because the enemy takes what is holy and sanctified And causes confusion and division and animosity from within the holy saints of God.

And he tears apart what is meant to be holy.

And from the outside looking in, the world says, man, I want nothing to do with that.

Look at how they talk about each other.

Look at how they're always fighting.

Look at how they can never agree on anything.

Look at how there's never peace in the church.

Look at how there's always drama.

There's always church hurt.

There's always something.

And that's why I hate the devil.

Man, I hate the devil.

You you have to hate the devil and everything he represents.

Paul says, Abstain from every form of evil.

You know, as a as a kid, I hated the devil, but I I hated him because I thought that That's what you were supposed to do.

Supposed to shape the devil.

To me, the devil was like an evil villain in a movie, and he just needed to be put to death.

But as I've grown and matured and walked with people I have seen what he does intentionally to people and to marriages and to families and to ministries and to children and to churches.

And it makes you realize that this is not a movie, this is real stuff.

And his threat, watch this.

His threat is in the almost right.

That's where his threat is.

It's the almost good.

He's working through the fruit that looks good to eat, that's pleasing to the eyes.

In the Garden of Eve, Eden, there was no reason to question the fruit's ripeness and health other than God did not bless it.

The enemy is working in the things that look good, but that God has not blessed.

Church, I believe many of us, I'm almost done.

I believe that many of us have made it to the Promised Land or are on our way to the Promised Land without the Spirit of God.

But because it's it's the promised land, it's the land that flows with milk and honey, it's it's the land that God wants me to get to.

We assume that the Lord is there.

God told Moses when the people rejected him, he said, Go to the promised land, go Take your people, but I ain't going with you.

God gave Moses permission without giving him his blessing.

And a lot of us are walking in the permission without the blessing.

We're walking in what appears to be good, what we think is good, but the Spirit of God is not there.

I don't want permission without a blessing.

I don't want to be in God's permissible will.

I want to be in God's perfect will.

I don't want to look spiritual if I'm not actually spirit-filled.

Without the authentic power and presence of the Spirit of God, listen, we've got enough.

Nothing we've got nothing.

So two final things, and I'll end with this.

If you're gonna be baptized, I'm gonna go ahead and dismiss you.

But two last things To the church.

Test everything.

You listening?

Test everything.

Test it with the word of God Test it through prayer.

Test it through fasting.

Test it through godly counsel.

Don't quench the spirit.

Don't despise prophecies.

Seek more of the Spirit of God.

If you've written off the prophetic gifting.

If you say God doesn't speak for prophets anymore, God doesn't speak that way anymore.

Think again See, because God spoke in the Old Testament specifically through certain people, but in the last days he said, I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh.

So if he was doing it back then, he's doing it even more now.

Don't write off the prophetic Don't write off the Spirit's gifting because you've seen it misused too many times Ask God to open up your eyes to his true glory through the power of the Holy Spirit in his church.

Don't roll your eyes when you hear a prophetic word.

Don't write it.

Don't write it off before going to God and testing it.

That's your duty as a Christian.

To test, to discern.

Now those with spiritual gifts I could be here all day talking to you.

With great power comes great responsibility.

We also must test the spirits.

We have to.

Pastor Danny, myself, we can't get too comfortable preaching the word of God.

We have to stay studied.

We have to stay in prayer.

We have to stay in the spirit.

God forbid we ever get up here on our own authority.

Test the spirit.

Pray on that word.

Pray on that.

And if you're still unsure.

That you have a word from God, you're not, man, I don't know if it's God, or do I say it?

But you feel like you got to release it, release it.

Release it.

But don't say, God told me, unless you are 100% certain.

This is why.

And this is why I'm I'm I'm teaching a little bit more today.

But in churches all across the world, man, can I tell you that people are hurting Can I tell you that people are broken and in their hurt and in their brokenness, they're vulnerable.

And they're ready to listen to somebody.

We've got something good to say.

Don't misuse the Spirit.

Paul told Timothy, handle the word of God with care.

Don't be careless.

Don't speak with an agenda.

Seek to know the difference between right and almost right.

If we can be the church that operates in that power The unadulterated power of the authentic Spirit of God.

If we could be the church that puts under the microscope anything that claims to be of the Spirit. and test it.

I believe we will operate in the full glory of Pentecost once again.

I believe that our tongues will be genuine, that the spirits move will be pure and not manufactured.

God's church will grow even more and the kingdom of God the I'm sorry the kingdom of darkness will not stand a chance against the church that is truly and unifyingly moved, led and empowered by the Spirit of God.

That's what we need more of.

We need more power.

We need more authenticity.

We need more spirit in the lives of spirit-filled believers.

So I want you to stand with me.

And I want to pray this prayer over you.

Right there where you're at.

If you would raise your hands.

Holy God, hear this prayer, Father.

Lord God, let us be your true sheep, Father.

Let us know the sound of your voice, my God.

Lord, let us Let us be uncomfortable, my God, with things, Lord, that are not of you.

God, give us your voice, but also give us your ears.

Align our spirit, align our emotions.

Align our hearts with yours.

I pray against a spirit of confusion.

I pray against distraction.

I pray against an enemy who cunningly seeks to destroy what belongs to you.

God, protect your saints, my God.

By the power of Of your spirit.

Let us be a church that pleases you, my God.

Let us be a church that is empowered by you.

Let us be a church that is moved by you in Jesus' name.

And I pray that you would rid us, my God, of anything that might be good.

Is not God cover us, my God, in Jesus' name that we would be the church that makes you proud, that we would be the church that goes out and wins souls, that we would be the church, my God, that continues.

To deliver, my God, and bring people to repentance.

May we be a church, my God, that operates in the gifting of the Spirit, my God.

I pray in Jesus' name that when we would speak in tongues, they would be prophetic, my God.

They would be from heaven, my God.

Lord, I pray that when we deliver.

A word of edification or exhortation, my God, it would be from the mouth of your spirit in Jesus' mighty name.

Baptize us in your spirit in Jesus' mighty name.

Hallelujah.

We worship you, my God.

Church, these altars. are open if you need prayer a prayer team from more.

Thanks for listening.

If you'd like some more information on PNEUMA Church, visit us on our website at mypneumachurch. org.

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Thanks again and God bless.