Sid: My guest is a teacher’s teacher; he has a mantle from God. This man has been called to teach and many of you are familiar with his bestselling book “The Bait of Satan” but he’s had many bestselling books. As a matter of fact 20,000 churches or more in North America use his teaching materials. But I have to tell you the most fascinating subject to me to understand is who is the Holy Spirit? And I believe that John is going to introduce you to a classic teaching but before we do that you were talking on yesterday’s broadcast about a Holy Spirit, God visitation in Malaysia tell me about it.
John: Yes this does relate to the Holy Spirit so powerfully. While I was teaching in Malaysia woman were down front the auditorium was jammed packed, a huge auditorium. The Spirit of God came in and it was like Daddy… these women were like laughing hysterically, now this was back in the mid 90’s. I’d never really seen this in Asia and I realized that God was just loving on his daughters. Well, all of a sudden after 5 minutes lifted and the Lord said “I’m coming in differently.” And all of a sudden the atmosphere changed and this awesome, mighty, wonderfully terrifying presence comes in. And all of a sudden these women stop laughing and immediately they’re screaming like they’re on fire; now it wasn’t demonic. Now remember I was walking back and forth going “Oh my God! Oh my God!” because that presence was so amazing I knew irreverence wouldn’t be tolerated in that presence because the King came in, Daddy didn’t come in if that makes sense. And I remember I kept walking back and forth and I remember that out of mouth came these words “This is the Spirit of the Fear of the Lord.” And my mind went “That’s it!” Jesus the Bible says in Isaiah 11 “The Spirit of… the Lord will be upon Him, the Spirit of wisdom and knowledge, counsel, and the Spirit of the Fear of the Lord.” It goes on to say and His delight was in the fear of the Lord.” And I realized that this is one of the manifestations of the Spirit. And I remember right after that meeting it was the largest Bible school in the nation and there was a couple from the nation of India that were in that Bible school and the woman said to me “I feel so clean inside” and I said “I do too!” Well the next morning in my hotel in Malaysia I was praying and God said to me “Read Psalm 19.” I started reading Psalm 19 and I got the verse that says “The fear of the Lord is clean and enduring forever.” I remembered what she said “I feel so clean,” and so did her husband. I thought “The fear of the Lord is clean and it endures forever.” The Lord spoke to me Sid and the Lord said this, “Lucifer led worship before My throne, he didn’t fear Me, he didn’t endure forever.” He said “A third of the angels worshiped around the throne, they didn’t fear Me; they didn’t endure forever.” Adam and Eve walked in the presence of My glory in the Garden of Eden, they didn’t fear, they didn’t endure in the Garden forever. And He said “Every created being that is around my throne forever will be tested in not only the love of God but in the holy fear of God. And it was like a marker in my life and I realized right then that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. People ask me constantly “Where do these insights and revelations come from in these books?” And I can say it’s from the fear of the Lord that opens up the door to open and expand upon His word.
Sid: Well that begs a question “If you were like most Christians in north America that I know and you high fived God all the time and you acted as if you were a cheer leader and you say “Yeah God!” do you think that you’d be where you are right now?
John: No I don’t I honestly don’t I looked at… there is… you know Sid and you are going to be able to correct me; when they brought the children out of Egypt God said “The whole reason I brought you out was to bring you to Myself.” Moses goes up in the mountain Aaron was invited up and ends up back with the people because he was more comfortable in the presence of people than in the presence of God. Aaron ends up building a calf, he forms it with an engraving tool. And they look at the calf and say “Behold Israel Elohim.” Now Elohim is found about 2,250 times in the Old Testament. About 250 times it’s a false God; 2000 times God Almighty. Elohim is the word used for God all through Genesis chapter one; I think it’s like 30 some occurrences. So you always have to read it in context. But then Aaron makes a statement about that calf “Tomorrow is a feast the Lord.” That word Lord that he uses there is Jehovah or Yahweh. That is the sacred name of God and the Hebrews wouldn’t even write the vowel. And so Aaron looks right at that calf and says “There is Yahweh who delivered us out of Egypt.” So he doesn’t deny that God delivered him out of Egypt; he doesn’t deny that God saved them; he doesn’t deny that He brought them through the water and fed them. He just has changed his image to now it’s Jehovah who’s going to give me what I want. Well when you look at Roman’s chapter 1 Paul says “In the last day people are going to change the image of God into an image of man or four footed beast.” Now we don’t worship four footed beasts in our society we worship human beings, mankind okay. So because you see the Egyptians worshiped four footed beasts; they had statues of calves all over the place so they were accustomed to that. But my question is “Are we serving the real Jesus at the right hand of the Father, or have we created an image of Jesus that will give me what I want; I can high five Him treat Him like “Hey Baby, what’s going on Jesus” and really not be the real Jesus but the one that we’ve made in an image that will give us whatever we want.
Sid: I am almost wondering the scripture comes to my mind John is “The love of most will grow cold in the last days.” Maybe it’s because of the misunderstood image of God.
John: Well let’s talk about that scripture “The love of many,” and the Greek word there many does mean most, means majority is what it means; “Will grow cold.” Well what causes it to grow cold is because lawlessness will abound.” What is lawlessness? Lawlessness is when we’re not submitted to the authority of God. So what happens is we pull ourselves out from His authority by creating a Jesus that will give me what I want so therefore he’s really not the Jesus of the right hand of the Father we have conveniently slipped out from under His authority but we still acknowledge He saved me, He died on the cross but is He the real Jesus at the right hand of the Father. That’s what we have to ask.
Sid: And that’s an honest fair question that each person has to ask themselves. John tell me in your words who is the Holy Spirit to you?
John: Well the Holy Spirit is the third person of the Godhead and He is my very closes friend on earth. I never would be talking to you on this program had it not been for the Holy Spirit. One of the things that deeply concerns me is that if you say Holy Spirit to a person they immediately want to talk about His manifestations, His gifts or power rather than talking about Him as a person. I personally am much more interested in knowing Him as a person before I know His power and manifestation. It’s kind of like this “If I meet a woman and I realize that this woman she is very very well known in the community; let’s say I’m a single man she is very wealthy and I want to marry her because I’ll get her wealth, I’ll get the popularity, I’ll get the power in the community to get things done rather than coming to know her first as a person. And so I think many have gotten their relationship with the Holy Spirit backwards. They’ll study out His manifestations, they’ll study out His gifts, they’ll talk about His power; talk about His manifestations which are all important, don’t get me wrong but they don’t first of all seek Him as a person.
Sid: Now you teach a lot about a word called communion is that what you’re talking about now?
John: Yeah, the word communion when I was a Catholic boy to me it was taking those wafers and sneaking the wine as an altar boy after the service. But that was not what communion means. The Greek word for Communion is the Greek word koinonia and it has many definitions but the major ones I highlight in the book are partnership and fellowship and intimacy. Now fellowship is interacting, it’s companionship. Sid can you imagine if you pick me up at the airport when I fly into do the television programs with you. Let’s say that you pick me up at Charlotte Airport and we got a 20 minute drive. I don’t way one word to you and you don’t say one word to me. Not “Hello” not “Good Morning;” not how’s your family; thank you for coming; nothing. That whole…we can’t even imagine that. I mean for people that are listening to us can you imagine carpooling with your neighbor and you drive 20 minutes to downtown Charlotte let’s say and you don’t say one word to them when they get into the car. Yet how many times do we drive 20 minutes and not say anything to the Holy Spirit?
Sid: Well I’ll tell you what we’re out of time right now. John, it’s a new book, new teachings, but what kind of feedback are you getting on your book “The Holy Spirit” and your teaching DVD’s and CDs?
John: You know what’s thrilling me; this is the greatest feedback even pastors have said this to me “My whole relationship with the Holy Spirit has changed my Christian life has become much more exciting and so much more full.”
Sid: What about people that are kind of opposed to the gifts of the Spirit for today, have any of those read your book and any feedback?
John: You know I was prepared for it but interesting enough because in the book I talk about Him as a person and I walk through and there’s tons of scriptures laid out in order in this book. I think what happened is a lot of them have seen Him as a person and it open’s them more up to His gifts and manifestation. And I also show because most people their reason for not knowing His manifestations today is they say that which is perfect has come.
Sid: Well we’ll pick up there on tomorrow’s broadcast.
Tags: its supernatural, Sid Roth