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you want the manifested presence of god
i’m talking about where you can look
back over your circumstances and realize
that his fingerprints were all
throughout that thing i’m talking about
where you can see footprints in the sand
as you actually recognize that god was
walking beside you the whole way i’m
talking about what other people call
coincidence encounters you see the
sovereign hand of god that was aligning
your footsteps and setting you in the
right place at the exact right time the
manifest presence of god
i want to submit to you
that jesus is there
in this difficult moment in your
marriage in this trying moment in your
finances in this struggle on your job in
this difficulty in this relationship
you’re rubbing corners with your boss or
your spouse or this struggle you’re
having on your university campus or in
your high school campus this hard time
that you were having he is there he just
may have come in the package you don’t
prefer
and that oftentimes the fingerprints of
god are not recognized not because he’s
not there it is just because the
expectation we have set up about what he
looks like and how he will speak and how
he will move the prayer request the
solution that he will bring doesn’t
align with the prayer requests that we
have prayed we have boxed god into the
way we want him to answer instead of
believing that his ways are not our ways
and his thoughts are not our thoughts as
high as the heavens are above the earth
that’s how high his thoughts are above
our own and so we box god in when we say
lord answer my request in this
particular way do you know
that you limit not god but you limit i
limit our experience of god when we say
lord answer my request exactly this way
i have learned to pray here lord is my
request you said that i can make it
known here’s how i would like to see you
move in my circumstance thank you lord
that i can come boldly and make my
request known so i’ve made my request
but at the end of that prayer i’ve
learned to pray lord do it
or do something better
because do you know there are categories
of options
that our brain doesn’t even know are
available and accessible to us and if we
limit god to what we can think and what
we see as the way we have not even
considered
the categories of opportunity that this
divine holy almighty being has
accessible to him y’all he’s not just
thinking about you he’s thinking about
your children and your grandchildren and
your great-grandchildren and those that
are to come and how his kingdom purposes
are going to be outworked in this
generation
and so on this occasion the messiah
shows up and nobody recognizes him
except somebody say accept
except a guy named simeon
he had been told and promised
just like we have
that he would
see
the manifest presence of god he’d been
told it
he’d been promised just like we’ve been
promised because of our relationship
with god through christ jesus and the
holy spirit indwelling us that we will
see the fingerprints of god working in
our lives this is called the manifest
presence of god
it is unique to omnipresence
omnipresence means that god is
everywhere all at the same time i’m so
grateful for god’s omnipresence because
god’s omnipresence means that when i fly
back to dallas where i live when my new
friends that i just met from uganda fly
back to where they live um that when you
all fly back to wherever ever it is
you’ve come from whether all over
different areas of california or afar it
means that no matter where we go he is
as much with me as he is with you
because he is omnipresent
but if you’re anything like me you’re
grateful for his omnipresence but you
want more than that
you want the manifested presence of god
i’m talking about where you can look
back over your circumstances and realize
that his fingerprints were all
throughout that thing i’m talking about
where you can see footprints in the sand
as you actually recognize that god was
walking beside you the whole way i’m
talking about what other people call
coincidence encounters you see the
sovereign hand of god that was aligning
your footsteps and setting you in the
right place at the exact right time the
manifest presence of god
i wanted to know what made simeon’s eyes
open to recognize what nobody else in
this scenario did i figured whatever
opened up his eyes might open up our
eyes as well are you ready three things
that i want to point out to you it says
in verse 26 about simeon it says that it
had been
actually verse 25 i want to start there
there was a man in jerusalem whose name
was simeon he was righteous devout
looking for the consolation of israel we
could spend a whole lot of time in those
three but here’s where i want to heart
the holy spirit was upon him
the holy spirit
was upon him
it says
that he came into the temple verse 27
in the spirit
verse 26 says it had been revealed to
him
by
the holy spirit
look at the presence of the holy spirit
permeating this text look at how the
author has over and over and over again
highlighted the work of the holy spirit
in opening up simeon’s eyes to be able
to recognize the manifested presence of
god before him in the person of jesus
christ luke
here he is just in the second chapter of
this book and by the way just in these
first two chapters he has already
alluded to the spirit ten times
the work of god’s spirit is so powerful
and so needful to a fruitful experience
in the life of the believer that even
before the book of acts even before
pentecost even before the spirit has
come
luke points out the movement of the
spirit here in the life of simeon this
shows you how important the spirit’s
work is how critical it is to making
sure that your spiritual senses your
spiritual radar is heightened so that
you can detect the presence of god
the holy spirit was upon him now i want
you to see the work of god’s spirit this
is just the first uh characteristic of
simeon but i want to just just take some
time for just a few moments on it the
work of god’s spirit is so important it
deserves a little bit of our attention
here there are three ways that the holy
spirit is described as relating to
simeon in these few verses just just a
few ways that the holy spirit relates to
simeon in these few verses the first
thing it says is that the holy spirit
was upon him now listen i want you to
know that if you have placed faith in
jesus christ the holy spirit lives on
the inside of you
ephesians chapter 1
says that the moment you believed you
received the holy spirit you were sealed
by the holy spirit of promise
i want you to know that at the moment
you became a believer in jesus christ
you received the most incredible gift
you will ever receive this side of
eternity and that is the very presence
of god living on the inside of you the
holy spirit is not a ghost or a wind or
a fire or a dove he is often symbolized
by those things but don’t minimize him
that ain’t who he is the holy spirit is
the third person of the trinity not
third because he is least in value just
third because he’s the last to be
revealed to us in the pages of scripture
but all of the power all of the glory
all of the authority all of the grandeur
of god the father is in the person of
the holy spirit
which means
if you’re a believer in the holy spirit
lives in you
that means all of the grandeur and all
of the greatness all of the authority of
god himself now lives on the inside of
you so if you are a believer you have
the holy spirit you are not waiting on
more of the holy spirit all the holy
spirit you ever gon get you got the
moment you got saved
now you do need to be filled by god’s
spirit
so that his influence in your life grows
and grows so that you operate under the
gifting of the spirit so that you can
live according to the fruit of the
spirit that means living beyond your
natural capacity it means when your
patience runs out you can still have
more patience with that person it means
when gentleness has long since left the
building
you still find you got a little
gentleness for that when self-discipline
i mean you just don’t have no more
self-discipline in that area we need the
fruit of god’s spirit so we need to be
filled by the spirit as we yield to him
in obedience we are filled which means
he influences us more our mind is
renewed and transformed we are
sanctified into the image of christ
jesus
so the holy spirit
is in you
but simeon
his relationship with the spirit is not
described in that way
it doesn’t say that the spirit was in
him
it says that the holy spirit was on him
which means
there is a difference between the spirit
being in you
and the spirit resting on you
listen to me
the gift of god’s spirit in you oh this
brings tears to my eyes
the gift of god’s spirit in you
he will never leave you nor forsake you
there is nothing you can do to work
yourself out of a relationship with the
holy spirit
okay
but him being on you
you got to live a life i i want to live
a life that is a magnet for the presence
of god to rest on me
we can sit in this conference until
we’re blue in the face and applaud the
truths of god and say amen to the truths
of god but if we leave this room and
live in a way
that is out of alignment with the truth
of god we will not have the spirit
resting on us
if you want the mark of god’s presence
on you i’m talking about where other
people can see you operating in your
gift moving about in the assignments
that you have been given where they can
just see there’s a unique favor on your
life toward that particular task or that
particular endeavor where you are marked
by something that gives you favor that
gives you his grace for a particular
area of your life then you must live i
must choose to live in a way that honors
god so that god’s presence can rest upon
us
because he will not force himself on you
he offers you this resting of his
presence and his grace upon your life if
you will choose to live in a way that
does not
disturb his presence that does not keep
him from being able to be near you
because you have chosen here it is
to be
holy
dude and i were sitting together on an
airplane and he was seated over the wing
our seats were directly over the wing of
the airplane and so he was sort of just
looking out at the wing of the plane and
there we were suspended in midair flying
to our destination and i could tell he
was mesmerized by this whole concept
that this tube of steel is in the air
holding us up and that um this this wing
is connected to the plane he was sort of
just dissecting this entire this entire
situation and as he looked over the wing
he looked back at me
and said mom how do they get that wing
on this plane
and i said buddy i gotta be honest with
you i have no idea i have no idea how
they get that wing on the plane i don’t
know how it works but i have an idea for
you jude you have an uncle their dad’s
brother uncle vaughn he works in the
airline industry he actually works in
the business where they they make all
the veins and the wiring that connects
the different parts of the aircraft so i
saw this as a teachable moment i said
you should talk to your uncle vaughn
when we get home and it’d be a great
opportunity for you to learn something
and then i said to him you know what
you can be whatever you want to be when
you grow up do do you know that you can
do whatever you want to do like if you
want to make airplanes like your uncle
vaughn when you grow up you can so
totally do that if you’d like to and as
i said that to him i said buddy you can
be anything you want to be in your life
anything you want to do you can do it he
looked back at me and he said mom
i don’t want to do what uncle vaughn
does when i grow up i want to do what
you do when i grow up
[Applause]
you know it’s one of those moments where
you’re just thinking baby what do you
want whatever you want i’ma give it to
you
oh but wait for it
because i looked back at him and said
buddy
what does mama do
now i had expectations about what his
answer was going to be at least some
framework about how he might respond
lord i’d love to or mom i’d love to
share the lord with people mom i’d like
to write mom i would like to do a myriad
of different things maybe that he could
have said
but he looked back and he said mom
i want to do nothing just like you
you do nothing all day every day you do
nothing
i said buddy you see how
like the clothes you’re wearing right
now are clean how do you think that they
actually get clean he said well that’s
just like washing that’s no big deal i
said but you eat every day you eat
actual food how do you think it gets
cooked and he said that’s what moms do
that’s no big deal
and i said but you know every now and
then there’s a book or there might be a
bible study there’s even there was a
little film a little movie remember it’s
been we spent like three months maybe
that what do you think i’m doing he’s
like you just sitting behind the
computer all day just doing this you’re
doing nothing
i laughed and then i thought in that
moment right after the conversation
how much that is like my relationship
with the lord
in fact there was confirmation of that
because the very next day and i only
share this with you to make this point
but the very next day after that
conversation with jude
my publisher sent me an email they sent
an email to tell me about something that
they know i never know because i’m
keeping up with three sons they said
priscilla we just want to let you know
that fervent um a little book that i had
written we want you to know that it’s on
the new york times bestseller list it
actually won a few awards they said that
to me in the email and all i could do
when i looked at it was chuckle because
it was just the day before that my son
said to me
that when i was doing to him to what
looked like an amounted to nothing
that is exactly when i was crafting
something that hopefully would be a
blessing to people’s lives
and the holy spirit said to me that’s
just like you and me priscilla
because i’m behind the scenes
orchestrating and crafting the chapters
of your story all the while you think
i’m doing nothing you point an
accusatory finger at me wondering where
i am and why i’m not hearing your
request and why i’m not moving in the
way that you would like me to move
you’re assuming that i’m sitting back
passively ignoring you where all the
while i am busy making a story out of
your life the likes of what you can’t
imagine
i came to encourage somebody today
that there’s a chapter that is being
written right now with your story i’m
talking about right now in that
difficulty right now in that valley year
of your marriage right now in that
trouble in your finances that difficulty
on your job that hardship with your
co-worker i’m talking about that one
co-worker the one that if she says one
more thing to you you go knock her out
that one
[Applause]
there is a chapter he is crafting
a manuscript he’s writing
that one day when we see him face to
face
we’re going to see the story that he was
telling
and every single crown we get we’re
going to turn around and place it right
back at his feet
and say thank you lord for this
privilege that we had to live a life
a life in relationship with you
and so even with these hardships and
even with these hurts we pray and we
pray in gratitude we pray in
gratefulness in advance thanking him for
the answer that he will give us that is
simultaneous to what we’ve asked for or
the answer that is so far beyond our
capacity to even comprehend and pray
that we trust him for something that
that has so much generational ripple
effect the likes of which we may never
see in our grandchildren and our great
grandchildren and our great great
grandchildren i’m so glad for the
prayers of a grandmother and a great
grandmother and grandfather in my life
who prayed some stuff that y’all they
didn’t get to see the fruit of their
prayer
but how glad i am that they trusted him
to do what they were asking or
something better
and it occurred to me that while i did
value prayer i had neglected
intentionality with prayer
being strategic in prayer actually
trying to detect where you see the
enemy’s fingerprints
kind of his handiwork meddling in your
life
where you anticipate he might want to
take advantage of a weakness or a or a a
bit of divisiveness
and just being mindful of that so that
when we pray we’re not just randomly
saying words that we’ve heard all along
or words that we’ve kind of memorized
along the way or words that are
comfortable to us but we’re actually um
praying in a way that is targeted it’s
kind of exactly what you described a few
moments doing the work to find the
promises of god that actually apply in
everything that we know intentional
prayer
and then writing it down sometimes we
need to write our prayers down only
because it keeps us focused it reminds
us what we’re praying about you know so
when it’s posted there in that war room
and you come back in there day after day
you’re reminded this is your prayer this
is where you’re focusing your um your
prayer life on and until i see an answer
i’m going to keep praying this prayer it
also gives you a great track record with
god because then when god does answer
you can see that date at the top of that
page of when you started praying that
and then you’ll be able to put a date
down of when god answered however in his
sovereignty he chose to what a great
track record not just for you but your
grandchildren and your
great-grandchildren to see how grandmama
or uh grandpa prayed and believed that
god would answer wow i think that thing
i loved about or you know even the
prayer because in ephesians 6 it talks
about the armor you know which we’re
familiar with but then prayer is we’re
saying yeah that’s right kicks into
after that sword
it goes right to prayer and it’s not the
the the prayer that’s oh god why you
know the whining i mean you can do that
for a minute because maybe we all need
to whine for a minute that’s the
complaining side of it you can’t
complain to god because honestly the
psalms david complained for a bit yeah
and you know he went he went on a
journey with god he was intimate and
real with his pain and agony before god
and then there’s got to be a rising up
then there has to be a point where you
that’s the thing so at some point yes do
the complaining but at some point you
have to begin speaking the truth
of what god has to say about your
marriage about your health
and about your family about
reconciliation i just remember even that
for me with
just some situations and
you know family and extended family that
was hard it was so hard and and i
remember moments of you know the
complaining before god because of course
i was perfect and they were the problems
well everybody else needs to change yeah
if they would it would really help out
my life totally um then
but so i you know complained but then i
started
you know talking about pulling out the
scriptures that talked about unity and
reconciliation and and together and
faithfulness and just declaring that and
i’ve seen god do what only he could do
yeah in the lives of people i mean i saw
it in my health but i i’ve also seen it
in relationships with people and so i
just think that
that if if people understood more about
the power
you know some people say well all i can
do is pray no no that’s not all
that’s
the thing to do right
second um second chronicles 7 14. if my
people right who are called by my name
humble themselves and pray yeah right
then he’s going to heal our land we’re
too busy complaining about our land and
our government and all that’s happening
it’s like well you can complain
but if you prayed as much as you
complained maybe we would see something
different and you know what if i were
your enemy what i’d want to do is
devalue in your mind the potency of what
i know to be the most powerful weapon
you have against me so he’s made our
churches focus on being a house of great
programs or a house of great preaching
and a house of great singing
when they’re supposed to be a house of
prayer because it’s the prayer that
pushes back the kingdom of darkness so
if i were the enemy that’s exactly what
i do i devalue what i knew was the most
potent weapon that you had in your
arsenal against me so we do everything
first except pray pray so for you
personally so how do you
when do you when do you pray are you
late at night person are you the middle
of the day person are you well i don’t
wanna tell you first of all lest anyone
think that my life is you know i’m up on
a mountaintop praying and through my god
all day that’s right
um my life is very much like everybody
else’s that it’s kids laundries and
laundry and kids and it’s kind of that
thing where you know once your feet hit
the floor in the morning it’s over it’s
just full-on for the rest of the day
right and so um
i have this ongoing actually part of my
prayer is lord would you continue to
help me to prioritize this in my life
because it can so easily kind of get
pushed off of the that position of
priority so i just say lord i need you
to stir i don’t want to manufacture
passion i want you to stir in me a
passion to where i don’t want to go a
day without prioritizing prayer and then
hearing back from you listening to you
through the scriptures and so i try to
do that in the morning because it seems
like that’s the best time if i wait till
the end of the day it ain’t going to
happen no that’s the same with me no if
i don’t if in the morning if i if it
doesn’t happen then yeah then it just
gets it’s like if it doesn’t happen just
the very first time i know that once you
get going
but i will say i learned a bit from
brother lawrence that you know age old
saint from that book practicing the
presence of god um that really just
gives us freedom lifts that burden off
of us of feeling like if we don’t have
an hour to spend with the lord at the
beginning of the day that it’s a waste
of time to practice god’s presence all
day long yes so my kids are a little bit
older now but i went through a season
four five six years there where i would
just write down scripture verse on a
three by five card the same one on five
different cards maybe and i’d put one on
the bathroom mirror where i’d be washing
little hands all day one where i was
gonna be doing the dishes one where i
was folding clothes one near the sandbox
outside and i just would have the same
verse for like two weeks so everywhere i
went i was just running into this verse
and by the time i got to the end of the
day not only had me and the lord talked
about this one verse a lot not only was
it inscribed on my heart but it became
god’s word to me it became
something that really there was a life
in it wasn’t just a verse i’d learned
there was life in it because me and god
been talking all day long for a couple
of weeks about the sentiments that he’d
um inscribed in this in this passage of
scripture so i think that idea of
practicing the presence of god
it takes that guilt off of i didn’t have
my quiet time and it didn’t look like
this and it didn’t fit in a comfortable
little box well look do it however you
got to do it right practice his presence
all day long how do we do that
well number one by being creative with
how you can feed yourself on his word so
my sister five kids she’s got this
little clip on her dashboard she’ll do
the same thing write a three by five
card down with scripture and she puts it
in that clip and so you know running
errands for two hours every day trying
to get kids to soccer practice and
everything she’s just running face to
face um in face to face with this with
this verse over and over throughout the
scriptures when things come up in the
middle of the day that are problems you
might call a girlfriend about you might
you can still call her but also
on god yeah just ask him about it ask
him about what scripture verse applies
to this particular
circumstance how would he want to lead
and guide you and you’ll be amazed how
you’ll begin to see the encounters that
you have the circumstances that align
the little beckonings and convictions of
god’s spirit how they all begin to work
together to help you to realize you
actually are hearing god’s voice and
seeing his providence as he steers you
in the direction of his will for your
life