South Shore Pentecostal Church

Announcer: Welcome to the Apostolic Truth Radio program with Pastor Craig Ouellette, our radio ministry of South Shore Pentecostal Church, located in Whitman, Massachusetts. At a time when many Christians do not know what to believe, South Shore Pentecostal is honored to bring you clear biblical teaching on which you can confidently build your faith. Thank you for joining us.

J. Craig Ouellette: We're going to talk about Pentecost, a game changer. Pentecost, a game changer. Amen. So we're going to start at Acts chapter 1, verses 4 through 8. In Acts chapter 1, verse 4, this is right before the Lord's getting ready to ascend up to heaven. He's been crucified, He's resurrected, and He's appeared to the disciples. This is going to be the last appearance that's recorded.

It says in Acts 1:4: "And being assembled together with them, commanded them that they should not depart from Jerusalem, but wait for the promise of the Father." Say "wait for the promise." "Sayeth He, which ye have heard of Me." So He's not bringing up something new, but He's been talking to them about this. Amen. This is back in the Gospels He's been talking. "For John truly baptized with water, but ye shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost not many days hence."

"When they therefore were come together, they asked Him saying, 'Lord, wilt Thou at this time restore again the kingdom to Israel?' And He said unto them, 'It is not for you to know the times of the seasons, which the Father has put in His own power, but ye shall receive power after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you. And ye shall be witnesses unto Me both in Jerusalem and in all Judea and in Samaria and unto the uttermost part of the earth.'" So they need the Holy Ghost for power. You need the Holy Ghost for power to live for God.

Acts chapter 2, verses 1 through 4: "And when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all with one accord in one place. Suddenly there came a sound from heaven as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting. And there appeared unto them cloven tongues like as of fire, and it sat upon each of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost and began to speak with other tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance." Say "they spoke with tongues."

Verses 16 and 18 in the same chapter. When the people are hearing what's going on, they're asking questions, and Peter stands up. He says, "But this is that which was spoken by the prophet Joel: And it shall come to pass in the last days, saith God, I will pour out of My Spirit upon all flesh. And your sons and your daughters shall prophesy. Your young men shall see visions, your old men shall dream dreams. And on My servants and on My handmaidens I will pour out in those days of My Spirit and they shall prophesy." Amen. Pentecost, a game changer.

I think a lot of people don't realize that. They don't realize it's a game changer. Amen. So in the book of Acts, we just read the birthday of the New Testament church. So Acts 2:1-4, the disciples are filled with the Holy Ghost, speaking in tongues as the Spirit gives them utterance. That event is the beginning of the New Testament church. Now there are believers recorded in the Gospels, but they're not part of the church yet. The church does not exist.

All right. The word "church" is only mentioned two times in all the Gospels, in the book of Matthew. Matthew 16:18, Jesus said, "I will build My church." Matthew 18:17, "if your brother offend you and they don't listen to you and they don't listen to the two or three you take with them, go to the church." Those are the only two times the word "church" is mentioned in the New Testament. You've got to be born into the church, the Bible says.

You can't join the church. You can't pay enough money to be in the church. You can't hang around long enough with other people in the church to be a part of the church. You don't get to be in the church just because you know a lot of Bible. You must be born again of the water and the spirit. Water means water baptism in Jesus' name, and spirit means Holy Ghost baptism. So the church can't exist even in the Gospels because you've got to be born of the spirit, and the spirit is not given yet.

That's part of it. So it can't exist except in God's concept and God's teaching and planning. Amen. So we look at this next thing here, and I try to have a picture here to illustrate it. Unfortunately, the colors don't come out that good here, but the Gospels cover the period of time from 4 BC to 29 AD, give or take some years. Depending on how you want to look at it, Jesus lived basically 33 and a half years in life. Where the Gospels end, the book of Acts picks up.

All right. So the book of Acts, and you can't see it, there's a red line near where the Gospels end there. A little bit after it, the day of Pentecost. That's where the church begins. So you've got people looking in the Gospel and trying to figure out how to get born again, or looking to understand what it means to be saved, but you've got to understand when the Holy Ghost comes, the game is changed. The rules are different. It's a new way that God is dealing with us. Amen.

So we go on and we look here a little bit further. The Gospels, they're important. We're not saying they're not important. We're not saying there's nothing in there, but the Gospels finish the foundation of the Old Testament. Honestly, the Gospels are under law because the Holy Ghost isn't given. Without the church, without being born again, without the death, burial, and resurrection, and the Holy Ghost being sent back, it's still law. They're still under law.

So God is dealing with the people in the Gospels differently than He's dealing with people after the birthday of the church. So the Old Testament, the Gospels give us the transitional information to bridge between the Old Testament and the New Testament. If we just went from Malachi and jumped to Acts, we'd say "What happened? How'd we get here?" Okay. And so the Gospels show us God fulfilling. They teach us about Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior.

They fulfill prophecies concerning the Messiah. They teach us about the kingdom of God and the principles of the kingdom. They prepare us for the new birth, right? That's John the Baptist, isn't it? "I'm baptizing you with water, but He that's coming after me's going to baptize you with the Holy Ghost and fire. I'm just getting you ready. I'm just preparing the way." Amen. If I'm moving you into repentance, you haven't seen anything yet when you get moved by the Holy Ghost. Hallelujah.

And so the Gospels, they provide the sacrifice and the atonement for sin through the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, and they tell us to wait for the promise. So just because Jesus rose again, we're not where we need to be yet. We need the promise. Ever think about that? Why don't the Apostles just take off after Jesus' resurrect? They believe. They believe. That's right. They believe, but they're not born again yet. They're not.

And so the Gospels, before Pentecost, we've got to look at this a little bit. Before Pentecost and the Gospels, the Spirit of God, which is the Holy Ghost, was not available to the average person. So God in His sovereignty moved with His Spirit. He placed it upon certain individuals and within certain individuals to accomplish His purpose and will. But the average person, there was not the promise in the Old Testament that they could get the Holy Ghost at that time.

There was a future promise. Amen. There was a future promise. So God would move with His spirit. So it's kind of like heaven's not really open until the Lord is buried, resurrects, and ascends back up to heaven and puts the blood on the true altar. But yet Moses and Elijah are there. God in His sovereignty sometimes goes around things, but He's going to because He knows He's going to take care of it. What do Moses and Elijah need? They've got faith in God. They've done everything they know how to do. But what they need is the blood of the Lamb, and the blood reaches back.

So we look in Psalm 51:11, it says God's spirit moved upon David. He said "Take not Thy Holy Spirit from me." David knew the spirit of God. Amen. David understood. He said "Open Thou my mouth and I'll bring forth praises." That's a statement from a person that understands what it's like to feel the spirit of God come on you, and the praises come out because the spirit of God is on you. That's what that is. Amen.

Bible says in Isaiah 63:11 that Moses had the spirit of God. And if you go back and you remember the story where Moses said "It's too much for me to handle," God says "Get 70 elders. I'll take some of the spirit on you and I'll put it on them." And when they got the spirit, they started prophesying. What I'm trying to say is we're not saying that the spirit didn't move in the Old Testament, but God did it with select people to move forward His plan and His purpose. Amen.

Peter said the Old Testament prophets had the Spirit of Christ, which is the Holy Ghost, in 1 Peter 1:11. Elizabeth, the mother of John the Baptist, was filled with the Holy Ghost, it says. John the Baptist had the Holy Ghost, but God is anointing select people and select situations to bring about His purpose and His will. But the Holy Ghost is not given until the day of Pentecost to the world in general.

All right. So what am I getting at? You can't say "Well, what about the thief in the cross?" He's before the Holy Ghost. He's before the Holy Ghost. "Well, Jesus said he'll be in paradise this day. He didn't get baptized and get the Holy Ghost." He's before the church. He's back in the Gospels. God's not asking, he can't get the Holy Ghost. It's not given yet. And he can't get baptized in Jesus' name because Jesus hasn't died and resurrected yet. So God's dealing with those people differently.

So John 7:37-39, this is Jesus speaking. He says "If any man thirst, let him come unto Me and drink. He that believeth on Me as the scripture has said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water." So it's letting us understand in the New Testament, Jesus is preparing people for the Holy Ghost. If you believe on Me the way the scriptures say, you're supposed to get it. You're supposed to get it. Not you might get it, or some get it. No, you're supposed to get it. Amen.

And then he goes on to clarify: "But this spake He of the Spirit, which they that believe on Him should receive. For the Holy Ghost was not yet given." That's Gospels. Holy Ghost is not yet given because that Jesus is not yet glorified. It's time. It's time. God, Jesus hasn't been glorified. He hasn't died, hasn't resurrected, hasn't ascended up to heaven. He hasn't been glorified yet.

Again in the Gospel of John, John 16:7, Jesus said, "Nevertheless, I tell you the truth. It's expedient for you that I go away. For if I go not away, the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, will not come unto you. But if I depart, I will send Him unto you." The Comforter is the Holy Ghost, John 14:26. And Jesus is saying He would not be present when the Holy Ghost comes. He says, "I'm going to go away and I'll send Him." If you're there, you don't need to send it. You give it. So He's not going to be there physically when the Holy Ghost is given.

You understand what's being said here? This is out of the Bible. That's John 16:7. You can go read it for yourself out of your own Bible. John 20:22, you've got people that think the Apostles got the Holy Ghost then. They couldn't have. They couldn't have got the Holy Ghost. So John 20:22: "And when He had said this, He breathed on them and sayeth unto them, 'Receive ye the Holy Ghost'." They didn't get the Holy Ghost. Why? Jesus is there. He says, "I'm going to go away and I'm going to send it." And the day of Pentecost has not yet happened.

And there's not a difference between getting the Holy Ghost and the baptism of the Holy Ghost, by the way. All right. The baptism of the Holy Ghost is when you get the Holy Ghost. Amen. You just got to hang on. All right. Like in school, all right. If you're always yelling at the professor, we won't get through the class. Okay. Praise God. Good questions. Okay. Amen.

We remember, Jesus also told the disciples to wait for the promise, didn't He? He said, "Wait." They don't have it yet. If they had it, why do they have to wait for the promise? So the promise is the Holy Ghost. I'm going to read it in John 14:26 because I said it, but I'm going to read it so that you know that the Comforter is the Holy Ghost. John 14:26: "But the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in My name, He shall teach you all things, bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you."

Now, again in Acts 1:4, at the end of the book of Luke, Luke closes saying, "Wait for the promise." Luke 24, "Wait for the promise." Acts 1:4, "Wait for the promise." So it's telling us when the Gospels end, the promise, they have not received it yet. They're waiting for the day of Pentecost. So what is this promise? This promise is given in the Old Testament in many places. In Isaiah 28:11, it says, "With stammering lips and another tongue will I speak to this people." So there's the tongues. It's letting us understand when the Holy Ghost comes, you're going to speak in tongues.

That same verse in 1 Corinthians 14:21, Paul says, "I thank God I speak in tongues more than you all." And then he goes on a little bit further and says, "With tongues of other men I'll speak to this people." So he references, Paul references this scripture in 1 Corinthians chapter 14, letting us know it's talking about the Holy Ghost. Jeremiah 31:33, again, God speaking to His people there: "But this shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel: After those days, sayeth the Lord, I will put My law in their inward part and write it in their hearts and will be their God. They shall be My people."

So God is telling us that something was going to happen that causes God's law to be written in our heart. So in other words, it won't always be outside of us. If it's just in my mind, doesn't mean it's in my heart. Because if in the mind meant the heart, Israel wouldn't have committed half the sins they did because they had it in their mind, but it hadn't reached the heart. The heart's going to affect what we do. Amen. So He said, "I'm going to put My laws inside you. I'm going to put them in the inward parts. I'm going to write it in your hearts."

Well, devil's not going to write God's law on your heart, is he? And the angels can't really do it. And you can't do it. So that means, and God says He's going to do it, that means I've got to have God's spirit. This is what this is talking about. In Ezekiel 36:26-27, He says, "A new heart also will I give you and a new spirit will I put within you. And I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you a heart of flesh. And I will put My spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and ye shall keep My judgments and do them."

So God in the Old Testament is talking about a new relationship with God. Personal relationship with God. Where the Ten Commandments are not in some kind of ark, they're not written on some wall and I've got to go over to see them. But we're talking about now where God is going to be in us. And God's going to change the heart when He comes. He'll take away the stony heart. That's our human heart where we resist God. We don't want to do it God's way. We almost want to do it God's way. But God, can't You just change this area?

Amen. That's why sometimes people don't get the Holy Ghost. They're 90% there, but they don't want to change that area. But when you decide "I'm giving up, it's all to You, God. You can change it all. You can rip me inside out. You can roll me down the aisle. But I've got to have the Holy Ghost." That's when you get the Holy Ghost. I don't care what anybody says. They can laugh, they can shout, they can mock, but I've got to have it. I've got to have the Holy Ghost. And when you get that mind, you get the Holy Ghost. Hallelujah.

Amen. So Isaiah talks about it, Jeremiah talks about it, Ezekiel talks about it, and in Joel 2:28-29, it says, "I'll pour out My spirit upon all flesh. Your sons and daughters shall prophesy. Your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions. Also upon the servants and upon the handmaidens in those days I'll pour out of My spirit." The Holy Spirit was made available to all humanity, not just the Jews, by this prophecy on the day of Pentecost. Now that's the Old Testament we're reading, but Peter's going to quote it on the day of Pentecost to explain what's going on.

So notice what He's saying here: "I'm pouring My spirit out on all flesh." It's a new dimension. Up to this point, God's been dealing with the nation of Israel. God's saying it's not going to be limited to Israel anymore. All people. Amen. Up to this point, God has been primarily using men, but now it's saying sons and daughters. Sons and daughters are going to prophesy. Holy Ghost's going to move on women too. They're going to prophesy. Hallelujah. Amen. Servants and handmaidens, doesn't matter of your class.

Amen. You might be a servant and a slave. You might be in a mine pit someplace, but you get the Holy Ghost, you're going to prophesy. You don't have to have money, you don't have to have status. You just have to have Me. You get the Holy Ghost, you're going to prophesy. Amen. That's what speaking in tongues is. It's the Holy Ghost taking your tongue and giving you the language God wants you to have. That's the prophesying. Amen. It's speaking under the unction of God.

Every time you let God take your tongue and God speaks through you, you are letting the Holy Ghost prophesy through you. Amen. You may not understand it, but the devil understands it. God understands it. Your spirit understands it, and there might be somebody nearby that does understand it. Hallelujah. Amen. So on the day of Pentecost, going back to Acts, when they start speaking in tongues, they roll out into the city and people go, "What's going on here?"

Some are laughing. That's the same way when you get the Holy Ghost, you're going to have people laugh at you. It's okay. It feels so good you don't care. Hallelujah. You can laugh. That's okay. You do your thing, I'm going to do mine. All right. I'm going to have fun with God. Hallelujah. When your party's done, you'll have a headache. When my party's done, I won't. Hallelujah. Praise God. When your party's done, you'll feel guilty. When my party's done, I'm not going to feel guilty. I'll feel great. Hallelujah. Praise God. When your party's done, you'll think you need another one to recover, but I'll feel motivated to live. I'll feel motivated to live for God. Hallelujah.

So when they're asking Peter, "What's going on? What are these guys doing? They're acting like they're drunk, but I hear them talking about God. And not only that, but we understand they're talking in languages we know they don't know, but we understand." So Peter says, "This is what the prophet Joel had prophesied." In verse 16, Acts 2:16, and Acts 2:17-18: "It shall come to pass in the last days, sayeth God, I'll pour out of My spirit upon all flesh. Your sons and daughters shall prophesy. Your young men shall see visions, your old men shall dream dreams. And on My servants and on My handmaidens I will pour out in those days of My spirit and they shall prophesy."

Now notice, Peter changes it a little bit because he says, "On My servants and on My handmaidens I'll pour out of My spirit." In other words, if you're living for God, you're supposed to have this happen. If you're living for God, you're a servant of God. Amen. Your life is supposed to rearrange around what God wants you to do. How God wants you to live. Amen. The servant doesn't go to the master and say, "I want this day off." The servant doesn't say, "Well, I don't like the order that you gave me the chores or these are the tasks. I want to work in that field."

The servant goes where the Lord says to go. He says, "On My servants and handmaidens will I pour out of My spirit." The reason the church is weak is you've got people claiming they're Christians that are really not serving God. They're really not yielding to God. So Peter repeats that. He calls back from Joel 2:28-29, and he lets us understand that God is now making His spirit available not just to Jewish people, but to the world. And even though Peter's saying this, he doesn't really understand yet.

Okay. Because it's going to be Acts chapter 10. It's going to be about 10 years before the first Gentiles come into the church. So sometimes God can have you say something and you don't even realize what you're saying. That's right. Took Peter a while. God had to give him some visions. God had to work with some other people. Had to bring the church around. So notice Peter's preaching response to the crowd: The spirit's now available to all humanity. It's for men and women, not just men. Men and women.

You know, you've got people that think that women shouldn't teach or preach, but Bible says here they're prophesying. Most time prophesying's taking place in church. They're speaking under the unction of God. It's for all classes: servants and handmaidens. God's servants would prophesy, both men and women. Once people receive the spirit, they would have the law of God in their hearts. Amen.

See, the Holy Ghost makes you want to live for God. Why? Because that law gets put there. And that presence of God. And you think, "No, I don't want to go over there because it's going to drag this out of me. I don't want to do that if it's going to dampen this down. If I've got to get rid of that to keep this, that's okay. Go. I don't want to think that way if it's going to take it. I want to get my mind into that same place that I was when I received it the first time." Hallelujah.

And so Peter told them that this promise is for all, as many as the Lord our God would call. So this Holy Ghost is for everybody. Now the promise of the Holy Ghost, it couldn't come until there was an answer for sin. That's why God didn't give it in general. There wasn't an answer for sin. God in His mercy and longsuffering let sin be covered up by the rituals of the blood of animals, symbolizing the true sacrifice. But all those animals that shed, all they did was cover it. They didn't really deal with the sin.

It couldn't atone for the sin. Book of Hebrews: The blood of bulls and goats cannot atone for sin. Otherwise Jesus did not need to go to the cross. But the Holy Ghost can't come until He's died, been buried, rose again, and now showing that a man, God in a man, has conquered sin and death. Amen. Meaning He's conquered the devil. So now the blood that atones for sin is available to cleanse us so we can receive the Holy Ghost. Amen.

So on the night of the Last Supper, Jesus said that His blood was going to be the testament of the new covenant. We usually use this for communion. But Matthew 26:28: "For this is My blood of the new testament," or covenant. Means the same thing. "This is My blood of the new testament, which is shed for many for the remission of sins." Now He doesn't really have it there. He's saying, "This cup that I'm giving you symbolizes My blood. It's not the real blood. It symbolizes it." Can't be the real blood because He's sitting there with His real blood in His body. Amen. He's sitting there. But that symbolizes the blood that's going to be shed for the new covenant. New Testament. Amen.

So we needed the blood for the remission of sins. In the book of Hebrews 9:22, New Testament, "Almost all things are by the law purged with blood, and without shedding of blood is no remission." No forgiveness, no freedom from sin. So I can go offer up a lamb and confess before God in the Old Testament. God would accept that and cover my sin, but it doesn't really free me from my sin nature. I need the blood of the Lamb applied to my life. I need the blood of the Lamb applied in me. Water baptism in Jesus' name applies the blood.

Amen. That's why Peter said, "Repent, get baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins." The freedom of sin, the forgiveness of sins. Amen. Not only you need to be forgiven, you need sin's hold broken on you, and the blood will break the hold. And the Holy Ghost will give you power to resurrect yourself above your old sin nature. That's why we need the Holy Ghost. We need something in us that's bigger than us. Something in us that's divine. Something that's supernatural. Something that gives you an unction to go above yourself. Something that gives you desire to change to be like God wants you to be. It's the Holy Ghost. Amen. The Holy Ghost and fire. Amen. You need some fire because it'll burn up the dross that's in you. It'll heat up what's not ought to be there and start to remove it out and burn it out. Amen. You don't need just a little touch, but you need Holy Ghost and fire. You need something that's going to motivate you. You need something that's going to cause you. "I've got to pray. I've got to have God. I've got to live for God. I've got to change. I've got to let God get a hold of me." Hallelujah. The Holy Ghost and fire. Not a touch of the Holy Ghost. The Holy Ghost and fire.

And we needed that so we could become the temple of the Holy Ghost. This is why Jesus at the well, talking to the Samaritan woman, said, "The hour's coming when you're not going to worship here or at Jerusalem. Because God is a Spirit. You're going to worship in spirit and truth." He's trying to let them know the Holy Ghost is going to come. You're going to be a temple of God. You won't need to go to Jerusalem to be a temple. You'll be the temple of God. Hallelujah.

1 Corinthians 3:16, Paul writing to the church of Corinth, and he says, "Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you?" In other words, when you get born again, it's not that God comes down and just zaps you and then you're changed. God comes down to live in you. God comes down to make you a temple for Him. That's why it matters how we dress, how we talk, where we go, how we think. Because we're God's temple. I mean, people put things on their bodies they'd never write on the walls of the church. But now you are the church, you're the temple. Amen. Praise God.

And then in 1 Corinthians 6:11, Paul looking back, he says, "Such were some of you." He's got a list of sins. He's got a big list of sins. Amen. He said, "But such were some of you." In other words, you did these things. You were whoremongers. You were homosexuals, you were lesbians, you were drug addicts, you were murderers, you were rapists, you were robbers, you were killers. You were dishonest. Such were some of you. You were drunkards. But you're washed. You're sanctified. You're justified in the name of the Lord and by the Spirit of our God.

Hallelujah. Some people can't wrap their head around that. He didn't say you're still drunkards. He said you were. The disease is overcome. You don't need AA, you need JC. Jesus Christ. Amen. And I'm not saying that there's nothing beneficial there, but you don't need to stay there. That should be a transition place. That's all that should be is a transition place where you realize and you get a hold of God. So the sending of the Holy Ghost, this is the whole thing. It's a game changer.

Okay. A game changer is an event that causes the rules to change. Either how you play the game changes or it's a new game, a different game. It's a paradigm shift. Okay. A paradigm shift is a fundamental change in approach or underlying assumptions. With the giving of the Holy Ghost, how you live for God changes. With the giving of the Holy Ghost, assumptions about approaching God have changed. Assumptions about who can know God have changed. Assumptions about who can be saved and used of God have changed. It's a paradigm shift. It's a watershed as some people say, that idea of a watershed event.

So a watershed event: You've got a mountain peak or you've got a ridge there, and when the rain's coming, where that peak is determines which way the water flows. When the Holy Ghost comes, God's flowing a different way than He was before. Events are working differently. So you can't go back and look in the Gospels and take all that stuff and try to use that to get saved. You can use the principles, but you need the baptism of the Holy Ghost. You must be born again and search your Bibles. This is where we trip. "Oh, God use me." Yeah, God can use you when you're not right. Just because God used you doesn't mean you're right with God or you got the Holy Ghost.

A lot of examples in the Bible. Even the high priest that was trying to kill Jesus prophesied. A true prophecy. Gospel John, I think it is. And he prophesied not because he was right with God, but because the office he was in. God used him in that office to prophesy. Balaam prophesies about the star, and he's not right with God. So you can have visions and prophecies and not have the Holy Ghost. That's right. You can be moved by God and not have the Holy Ghost. You must be born again. And the way you know you got the Holy Ghost is you speak in tongues as the Spirit gives utterance.

Listen. People don't understand that and they think, "Well, I don't have..." We're not talking about a gift of the Spirit, we're talking about getting the Holy Ghost. Okay. Gifts of the Spirit are a whole different thing. So speaking in tongues, gift of the Spirit, whole different subject than speaking in tongues as the sign of getting the Holy Ghost. But look in James. Look in James chapter 3, verse 1. Says, "My brethren, be not many masters, knowing that we shall receive the greater condemnation." For in many things we offend all. If any man offend not in word, the same man is a perfect man and is able to bridle the whole body.

So in other words, what James is saying: Any man or woman that's able to control their tongue is able to control their whole self and body. That's what he's saying, right? Then he goes on to say: "Behold, we put bits in the horses' mouths that they may obey us, and we turn about their whole body. Behold also the ships, which though they be so great, they are driven by fierce winds, yet they are turned about with a very small helm, whithersoever the governor listeth. Even so the tongue is a little member, boasts great things. Behold how great a matter a little fire kindleth."

In other words, our tongue, even though it's a small part of our body,'s got big power, right? Proverbs 18, death and life are in the power of the tongue. Amen. And so our tongue affects things. I mean, just look at all the turmoil that happens in the street because you get people out there saying things. Even when they're not true. Hallelujah. So he says, he says in verse 6, "And the tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity. So is the tongue among our members that it defileth our whole body and setteth on fire the course of nature, and it is set on fire of hell. For every kind of beast and of birds and of serpents and of things in the sea is tamed and have been tamed of mankind, but the tongue no man can tame."

Remember James said if any man can control their tongue, they're a perfect person, right? But now he says the tongue no man can tame. But there is one that can tame our tongue. It's Jesus. It's the Holy Ghost. That's why God's got you speaking in tongues. Because you're giving over the thing that you cannot tame or control. Giving it to God and letting God say what He wants to say. Amen. It's a sign you have yielded to God all the way.

Oh, that's why people don't like the speaking in tongues. You've got to yield. You've got to receive to get the Holy Ghost. Amen. You can't hold back a little, most of it. You can't give most of it and hold back a little bit. You've got to let go the whole thing. You finally got to let go your tongue, your voice, your mind, your thoughts, what everybody's going to say about you. You've got to let go. "Here it is, God." Hallelujah. Amen. And you can't control it, but God can control your tongue. Hallelujah.

So other examples of game changers, just to get the idea or paradigm shifts: When Adam sinned. That's a paradigm shift. The world's totally different, and you can't go back to it. Adam can't just step back, vomit the fruit up, and put it on the tree. Nobody. It's going to take a special act of God, like we read in the Gospels, to fix the problem. It's a game changer. It's a paradigm shift. Before Adam ate that fruit, he could talk to God without fear. But now after he's eaten that fruit, everything has changed. There's death in the world. There's death going to be death in his life, and he's alienated from God. It's a paradigm shift. Amen.

Confusion of languages at the Tower of Babel. Everybody speaking one language, they can all get together. God says "No." Zap. Everybody's got different languages. All of a sudden, the world is different. One people, all of a sudden there's hundreds or thousands of people, however many languages God came out with. You can't go back and tear the tower down. It's going to change everything. It's changed how God is now dealing with man. Before it's just a big mass of humanity. Now He's dealing with nations because those different tongues will create different cultures and nations. Amen.

The death, burial, and resurrection. That's a paradigm change. Because no man had overcome sin since Adam. No man had come out of the grave on his own power. So when Jesus died and rose again, it was a paradigm shift. "Wait a minute. There's a man that couldn't stay in the grave." The devil's afraid now. "There's somebody, there's a man that can't I can't keep in the grave. There's a man I don't have power over. There's a man I can't tempt. There's a man that's got power over me." Amen. There's a human being. Amen. He's resurrected. That's a paradigm shift.

There's blood. And when He ascends up to heaven and sends back the Holy Ghost, a paradigm shift is now occurred in the world. God is now dealing with humanity in a way that He never dealt with humanity before. You must be born again, and you can be born again. Don't need animal sacrifice anymore. I got the blood. Got the blood. I just got to obey what God says. I just got to go where God says. I just got to do what God says to do. If He says repent, I'm repenting. If He says get baptized, I'm getting baptized. If He says it's got to be in Jesus' name, I'm getting baptized in Jesus' name. If He says it's got to be under the water, I'm getting under the water. Amen. If He says I need the Holy Ghost, I'm seeking for the Holy Ghost till I get the Holy Ghost. Amen. I'm not waiting. Hallelujah. I'll be in the altar. I've got to have the Holy Ghost. I'm not waiting for the altar call. I'm going to reach out for God. Hallelujah.

Again in 1 Corinthians or 2 Corinthians 6:16, He says, "What agreement has the temple of God with idols? For ye are the temple of the living God. As God has said, I will dwell in them and walk in them, and I will be their God, they shall be My people." See, when you get the Holy Ghost, you become the temple of God. It's not that when you leave church, God stays here and you go without Him. When you leave church, God's supposed to go with you. When you get to your home, or you get to your job, since you're the temple of the Holy Ghost, the Holy Ghost is supposed to be there with you. Amen. It's not, "Well, I'll wait till I get home and pray through." It's God's supposed to be going with you. The Holy Ghost. We are the temple of God. Hallelujah.

So now just to show you, okay, Paul in preaching. Paul in preaching, okay, that God was dealing differently. Paul says in Acts 14:16, He says, "Who in times past suffered all nations to walk in their own ways." In Acts 17:30, Paul speaking to the Greeks at Athens, he says, "Forasmuch then as we are the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the Godhead is like gold or silver or stone or graven by art and man's device. And the times of this ignorance God winked at, but now commandeth all men everywhere to repent."

What's it saying? It's telling us God is now dealing with humanity differently than He did before the day of Pentecost. Paul's preaching this, okay? Again in Romans 3:24, this one's not quite as clear. You might have to think about it a little bit. But Romans 3:24, Paul says, "Being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God has set forth to be a propitiation," which means satisfaction. In other words, putting forth the blood and death of Jesus satisfies God's righteous judgment for sin. This is what that word means. "Through faith in His blood." Okay, it's not just believing on Him, but it's faith in the blood, right? "Faith in His blood to declare His righteousness." God's own righteousness for the remission of sins that are past through the forbearance of God.

In other words, God did not judge everybody's sin in the past instantly. God forbore, God put it off till there was the answer of the resurrection and the Holy Ghost. So the Bible's trying to help us understand. Pentecost is a game changer. Amen. The reason many people are confused is they're trying to reach back and not realize when the Holy Ghost comes, God is now dealing with people differently than He was before. And you need the Holy Ghost. You need the baptism of the Holy Ghost. That's part of being born again.

So when we look back in the Gospels, with the sending of the Holy Ghost, the Lord deals with humanity differently. What did Peter say? He said "Repent, be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost." How often do you hear that? Most churches you go to, just pray the sinner's prayer. Show me where Peter prayed that, or had somebody. Or "just believe on the Lord Jesus and you'll be saved." Peter didn't say that. He said repent. Repent.

In fact, earlier in his message in Acts chapter 2, he said that everybody that calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved. So when they wanted to know what to do, he didn't say, "Well, I just told you, call on the name of the Lord you'll be saved." He said "Repent. Get baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost." And as you study the book of Acts, you find that pattern repeated. Acts chapter 10, Acts chapter 8, Acts chapter 19, Acts chapter 9 with Paul.

Amen. The pattern is repeated. That's what they preached. They preached repentance, water baptism in Jesus' name for the remission of sins, and receiving the Holy Ghost with the initial evidence of speaking in tongues as the Spirit gives the utterance. In other words, I might not know the language, nobody on earth might know the language, but whatever language God gives you, that's what you speak. God gives the voice. Amen.

And I related this recently. A guy was talking about things that happened at Azusa in a book, Miracles of Azusa. And somebody got the Holy Ghost and they were quacking. Quack, quack, quack, quack, you know. And he goes, "I don't know about that." He goes, "That sounds kind of weird." But a little while later, he found out there's actually a language where they quack to talk. All right. One way you know it's the Holy Ghost: because when you're done speaking in tongues, you're going to praise God. Amen. You're going to want to serve God. You're going to want to serve God more than you ever wanted to.

That's the other test, okay? When the Holy Ghost comes, you don't feel afraid. You're not afraid of what you're feeling. It feels good. You're afraid of maybe yielding. You might be afraid of what God's going to ask you. That's usually what people are afraid. They're afraid what God's going to ask you. Okay. But you get that Holy Ghost, you feel good. You feel peace. You feel joy. You feel love. Amen. That's what happens when you get the Holy Ghost. So that's how you know. You're done speaking in tongues, okay?

You don't have to worry if it's the devil. If you're feeling good in Jesus, it's not the devil. That's the last thing he wants. But he doesn't want you to speak in tongues because when you get the Holy Ghost, you get the Spirit of Christ. And if you got the Spirit of Christ, you got the one that rose from the dead. You got the Spirit of the one that rose from the dead that the devil couldn't hold in the grave. That means the devil can't hold you in the grave. That means the devil doesn't have authority over you in Jesus' name.

So we look at the thief on the cross. People always say, "Well, the thief on the cross..." and I've already said this. The thief on the cross didn't have to get baptized. He's under law still. The Holy Ghost is not given. Jesus hasn't died yet, and He hasn't risen from the dead. So nobody's getting baptized in Jesus' name yet either really. But now when the Holy Ghost comes, it all changes. Repent. Not go to the temple and offer up a sacrifice. Repent. Get baptized in Jesus'. Not go get circumcised, get baptized in Jesus' name for the remission of sins. Receive the Holy Ghost. Amen.

So when you get the Holy Ghost, you get power. Bible says, "Ye shall receive power after the Holy Ghost is come upon you." Acts 1:8. 2 Timothy 1:7: "For God has not given us the spirit of fear, but power." Power, love, and sound mind. The Holy Ghost gives you power to live for God, power to overcome yourself, power to do things God wants you to do. It gives you love. It causes you to love others. It'll cause you to love yourself the way you ought to love. You can't love somebody else if you don't love yourself. You cannot give to somebody else something you don't have. Amen. But the Holy Ghost'll give you the power to love. And it'll give you a sound mind. So that means the devil can't make you go crazy. God can keep your mind. In Colossians 1:27, it says "Christ in us, the hope of glory." That's the Holy Ghost. The Spirit in Christ is the Spirit of God, which is the Holy Ghost.

Let's stand here this morning. I hope you see this morning that Pentecost, it's a game changer. It's a game changer. People are trying to pull the old rules and look at the New Testament, but it's a game changer. We've got to be born again now of the Spirit. When the Holy Ghost comes in a person, it changes everything. If you don't have the Holy Ghost this morning, if you want to come and you believe God, we'll pray with you and you'll get the Holy Ghost if you're willing to yield. God is still giving the Holy Ghost today. Amen. You want a refreshing of God, just come and worship at the altar here right now. This altar is open.

Amen. And the altar represents the presence of God. And when you decide "I want the presence of God in my life" and you approach God, God starts to move upon you. Hallelujah. Amen. We need to be refilled. We need living water again. Hallelujah. We need to have the water of God wash us. Hallelujah. And there's nothing like drawing water out of the well of salvation, the Bible says. "With joy shall ye draw water out of the salvation." Just come and praise Him. Just come and worship Him. Just come and yield and believe Him. Hallelujah. Amen. If you feel like you haven't been living for God the way you need to live, you need to come and let God fill you with the Holy Ghost.

If you feel like you've been stumbling along, you need to let God fill you with the Holy Ghost. Amen. If you've been fighting battles and you're worn out, you need to let God fill you again with the Holy Ghost. The joy of salvation. Hallelujah. Let that work in your life. Hallelujah. Come on. Hallelujah. It's a beautiful thing that God is doing. God's not a respecter of persons, but He wants you to have joy unspeakable. He wants you to have what you need. Hallelujah. He wants you to have overcoming victory. Hallelujah. He wants to remake your heart. Hallelujah. Amen. If the enemy's trying to put bad things in there, let's rebuke them out in the name of Jesus. If the enemy's sending bad thoughts, let's cast them down in the name of Jesus. Hallelujah. If the enemy's saying give up, you need to tell the enemy, "Greater is He that's in me than he that's in the world." Hallelujah. In the name of Jesus. Come on, let that Holy Ghost work. Let that Holy Ghost work. Hallelujah. Come on, let God do a mighty thing here. Hallelujah.

Tina Ouellette: Thank you for joining us today as we have studied the word on Apostolic Truth Radio. My name is Tina Ouellette, wife of Pastor Craig Ouellette of South Shore Pentecostal Church, located at 58 West Street in Whitman, Massachusetts. If you love praise and worship, you will love services at South Shore Pentecostal Church, and we invite you to come and worship with us.

Sunday School for all ages begins at 10:00 AM and our Sunday evening service begins at 6:00 PM. Adult Bible study and children's churches are held on Wednesdays at 7:00 PM. You can learn more about our church on our website at southshorepentecostal.com or you may call us at 781-447-1668. If you have been blessed by this radio ministry, you can help support Apostolic Truth Radio via online giving through Venmo at SSPCWhitman. Write us today and request a free copy of today's message and join us for another broadcast of Apostolic Truth.