Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy
heart, with all thy soul, all thy mind. This
is the first and great commandment. And the second
is like unto it, thou shalt love thy neighbor
as thyself. On these two commandments hang all
the law and the prophets. On these two commandments
hang all the gifts. Oh, that too. Yeah. That's
well put. So we hang everything. on love. God
promises in Joel 2 .28 to pour out His Spirit
on all humanity. Welcome to Global Outpouring,
where we contend for that promise outpouring,
we equip for that outpouring. so that we may
engage in that very outpouring. I'm Philip Buss.
And I'm Sharon Buss. Welcome to the podcast today.
We're so glad that you're with us. We're going
to talk today about revival and outpouring and
how important it is that we have to maintain
the love of God in our lives, because when the
love of God ebbs, revival ebbs. Thanks so much
for joining us today. We're so delighted that
we can do this thing together with you. And before
we get started, let me just encourage you, if
you haven't already done so, that you go to our
website, globaloutpouring .net, and that you
make sure that you are on our mailing list so
that we can stay in touch with you. It's just
really important to be able to stay connected.
And if you're enjoying this content, we would
love to hear back from you. We are delighted
when we receive some email or from the feedback
form. It just really means a tremendous amount
to us. like to read one of the emails that we
got recently from someone who writes from time
to time. And we're just delighted to hear from
Cheryl. And she says, I'm still really enjoying
your podcasts as well as Friday night live worship.
Now, in case you're listening to our podcast,
we never think to mention that we do on YouTube
and Facebook on the Global Outpouring channel
and Global Outpouring Facebook page, every Friday
night at 7 p .m. Central Time, we do a... I hate
to call it a program. We do a service. Let's
call it a service. We do a service called Friday
Night Live Worship. And most of the time it's
live. Once in a great while, we have to pre -record
it. But it's live and it's worship time and the
word and testimonies and whatever. So she said,
I'm still really enjoying your podcast as well
as Friday Night Live. They are all so good. I
especially like the Friday night live worship
from October 3rd, 2025. The new song that you
sang was over the top. I like to start my day
by praying in the spirit about 30 minutes before
I do anything else. Since that night, I've listened
to your worship almost every morning just to
keep my mind on track while I pray in tongues.
It has helped me so much. There was one part
where Sharon said, I totally blew that. Let's
start over. Then she responded to Philip, you
can't, because you said, right? I said, we'll
take it out of the mix. Yeah, or we'll edit that
out. Live recording. Yeah. I said, you can't
edit this. We're live. Let's try again. One morning,
now this is her going on. One morning, the Lord
responded, life is live and you can't edit, but
you can repent and start again and get it right.
Repenting is like editing. Your sins are made
white as snow by the blood of Jesus, giving us
a chance to get it right. And then she says,
you always ask for suggestions for podcasts.
For a long time, I've been thinking about how
much I enjoy when you share tidbits of what the
Lord has brought you through. I would enjoy a
podcast of y 'all telling more about yourselves
and your experiences in the Lord. Testimonies
are always good. Love and appreciate you so much.
Thanks for all the spiritual food that you freely
give. Blessings to you both. After that, I was
thinking about something that Philip actually
brought last week on our Friday Night Live worship.
It would have been, I guess it might be two weeks
from the time that you hear this. He shared an
experience that I want him to share again. And
I think that it will be like a foundation for
a springboard, shall we say, for this podcast,
for this episode. We'll tell the background to
it. Yes, go ahead. We talk about Sukkot. Well,
now, just to retrace our steps, we did an episode
about how to celebrate Sukkot. Yeah. And I think
we told the story about how we got to start celebrating
Sukkot. Yeah. God gave you this love to go camping.
Yes, exactly. Wow. And if you didn't hear that,
you can go back to episode, I think it was 285,
where we talked about that. Go ahead. Yeah, I
got it. Actually, here's the notes right here.
Yes. So anyway. So we are going to celebrate
Sukkot in a couple of days. And we have a favorite
spot we go to. We book it six months out. And
you have to book it, you know, because other
people do the same thing. And we have a spot
that we like. And it's right next to a wonderful
fishing river. We catch trout and freeze them,
bring them home. And so anyway, I'm looking at
our spot. And we're like a month out. And I realized
that they're letting water out of the dam for
over like a month. They're draining the lake
down because there's too much water, getting
ready for the fall season. And so that makes
fishing not very good if you're on the shore,
which is how we fish. But if you have a boat,
you know, you can go with the current and fish
that way. So anyway, I'm watching that. I thought,
oh, well, there's other stuff I'm geared up to
fish for, you know, in the rapids. And we get
this. Think from the Army Corps of Engineers
campground we're going. Two more days, you know,
just two more days. Hey, we were excited. Yeah,
and so that night at about 8 o 'clock at night,
we get another email from them saying that our
reservation, the second day of our reservation
on, they're closing the campground so they can
repave it. And they're stating it's not anything
to do with the government shutdown. And our experience
from a year or so before, we set up our tent
in faith, you know, and we had one day till the
shutdown and the campground is empty. And then
all of a sudden, two hours before the shutdown.
They got it resolved. Yeah, that was the previous
time. And we had a nice, quiet campground. I
had the river to myself. It was great. And we
just enjoyed that. I think we caught a lot of
fish that time, too. We did. It was a great time.
So that's how the mindset has kind of been along
that way. It's all about fishing. Yeah, catching
fish and trout. And so now we find out we have
to go somewhere else. I thought, where can we
go? For eight days straight, there's a lot of
spots available in different campgrounds, but
not for that long of a stretch. And then we find
one all the way down south of us by Hot Springs
on a lake called Lake Ouachita. And it's like,
okay, it seems to be our only choice. So we book
our reservation there, and we get to this campground,
and we come to the little thing you enter in,
you know, where you sign in. There's nobody in
it. Just take this tag and put it on a little
post by your campsite. And we have a reservation
and we get to it. And we are in the woods. It's
a national forest, actually. And there's a lot
of... Woods, it's all woods behind us and next
to us to the next camp spot. And just before
we left, we had bear attacked by our place. Yeah,
I mean, it was within our county. Within our
county, someone got killed by a bear attack.
And 30 days before that, there'd been another
bear attack in Arkansas. Yeah. And so one of
our friends texted me and said, you don't want
to go camping because of the bears, you know.
And, you know, that's pretty discouraging to
hear that because we're in a tent. We're not
in a camper. I'm not concerned about a bear if
you're in a camper, you know. But a tent's another
story. Right. So anyway, we get to this spot
and I'm looking, you know, and the only signs
of life is across from us. trailer there. It's
the camp host and he's a volunteer. He just got
there and, and I thought, well, and I'm kind
of, I'm not happy. Yeah. You know, because I
was geared on catching fish, different, different
kinds of fish, walleye, striped bass, hybrid
bass, hopefully. And all of a sudden here we
are at this campground and a few spots down and
away, there's the shower and all that. And it's
closed because Because of the shutdown, there's
not enough government people. You know, the contracts
are not there for those that come in and take
care of it. So the park rangers have to, so they
closed that one. And we had to have to go with
this for another one. So everything is not looking
good in my eyes. It was kind of falling apart.
Yeah. And so a few days later, you know, we thought,
okay, let's go fishing at the lake here. It's
dusk. That's when the fish come to shore. I use
every strategy that I can think of for bait,
for walleye, for anything that would come to
the shore at night. I got one bluegill about
the size of my hand, you know, and, you know,
it's just really. And so we're walking back,
and the next day we're going by, and there's
a guy that caught some catfish on a trout line
that he put out there. And we look up and here's
the sign up there saying warning. And it has
a fish with a line through it, you know, the
warning signs thing with a slash. The fish in
this lake have higher contents of mercury because
of mining and other natural stuff in the lake.
Yeah, it's just natural. It's natural. So, you
know, we don't want to, you know, keep any fish.
And it's just like it took the wind out of my
sail to even try to catch anything to turn it
loose. And so every morning and every night we
had a campfire. And normally my normal routine
in the morning on the other river, I'd get up
about 6 .30, 7 o 'clock, and you hear a lot of
ruckus out there because guys are getting in
their boats or whatever. Everybody's going fishing.
Everybody's going fishing. And I'd just cross
the road in front of us, go about 70 feet, and
walk down the bank to the river and just fish
from the shore and do very well. You know, probably
as good as the guys in the boats, you know. And
so we can't do any of this. And so I'm just kind
of a little bit of a pity party, you know, and
all that. So I'm reading the Bible, and I got
a book, and I was reading this book called There
Shall Be No M. That was by Arthur Burt, who has,
you know, he's over 100 years old, and he has
lived through revivals, and he's from Wales.
You know, so he knows all about the Welsh revival.
All the marvelous moves of God they've had. So
I'm reading that and what it takes and how the
downfall of revival is pride. Pride gets in the
way. And when man thinks, I can do this myself.
I've got this now, God. I see how you're doing
it. I'll do it that way. And we've read all kinds
of books on the Welsh revival. And other revivals.
And other revivals. And I never understood what
happened in the Welsh revival. And I read there
was Evan Roberts. He made this statement that
God is never going to move at all in this particular
denomination. Oh, yeah. Yeah. He said God's not
going to move. Some of the church people were,
because he's saying this publicly, and said,
can you please change your mindset on that? You
know, the way you're saying this. He said, no,
God's not going to use this organization for
revival at all. And what Arthur Burt says after
he said that, the Welsh revival started to ebb.
Wow. I thought, wow. And I never knew why. Yeah.
You know, we've heard all the different moves
like Pensacola. The elders, church people got
together. We want our church back. And they didn't
want to have the schedule of revival. I think
similar things may have happened in Toronto,
and that move went on a long time. It was powerful.
But every revival that we have seen. Move of
God has ebbed, you know. So, you know, I'm reading
this book, reading what it takes to be an instrument
for revival. You know, how you've got to get
rid of pride, and he dealt with his own circumstances.
And he talked about his own downfalls when he
would get proud. Yeah, he mentioned things, and
I thought... He humbled himself. And I remember
our founder, Sister Gwen, said, don't ever put
me on a pedestal because I'll have to get knocked
off. And we understand that very, very much.
So anyway, I'm reading one morning and I just
hear this thing, glowworm. I thought, are you
a glowworm? A glow worm, you know, okay. So what's
a glow worm? So it's a worm that glows. So anyway,
my first thought that comes to my head is Isaiah
chapter 41. And, you know, Israel has had its
wars. It has its good kings, has its bad kings.
And when they have a good king, everything prospers.
And when they have a bad king and he lets in
idolatry or doesn't do anything about it, you
know, things start going downhill. And it might
take 30 years or so. And then things get just
really bad. And all of a sudden, nations are
coming in. They're robbing the harvest. And all
kinds of things are going into captivity. And
that happened after four bad kings in a row.
I think Zedekiah was the last bad king. And I
think they put his eyes out and then marched
him to Babylon. It's sad endings when you read
that. It's about what happens. But Israel is
God's chosen people. Right. From way back when,
thou art mine, I've called you by my name, you
are mine. That's out of Isaiah also. So God,
even talking judgments, has great mercy. Absolutely.
Long suffering. I mean, he lets stuff go a long
time. I've been looking at that. There seems
to be something like a 400 -year cycle where
God makes promises, and he tells the people to
obey him, and there'll be a generation or two
that'll obey, and then they go into idolatry
and the sins that bring the curse on the land.
God is very patient. I mean, I think 400 years
is very patient. That's very, that's very, very
patient. So it's, you know, it's 430, 400 this,
400 that, you know, almost 400. But there's this
kind of cycle that, you know, people that read
the Old Testament and think that God is just
mean and just judgmental, they don't realize
the amount of time that goes by in between these
things before God actually brings the hammer
down. Yeah. So I went to the book of Isaiah.
I just love the book of Isaiah. Oh, yes. How
many people have, you know, kings and government
officials, you know, they quote from this a lot
of times not even knowing, you know, where Scripture
comes from. So anyway, Isaiah 41, and in verse
10, so this is the Lord speaking through Isaiah,
Fear thou not. This is King James. Fear thou
not, for I am with thee. Be not dismayed, for
I am thy God. I will strengthen thee, yea, I
will help thee, yea, I will uphold you with the
right hand of my righteousness. You know, because
God is all about righteousness. Behold, all they
that were incensed against thee shall be ashamed
and confounded. They shall be as nothing, and
they that strive with thee shall perish. Sounds
like what's happening in... Gaza. Yeah. Thou
shalt seek them and shall not find them. Even
then that content with thee, they that war against
thee shall be as nothing and as a thing of naught.
We have seen that through Israel. Yeah. Modern
day. For I, the Lord thy God, will hold thy right
hand. Hallelujah. Saying unto thee, Fear not,
I will help thee. Fear not, thou worm Jacob,
and ye men of Israel. I will help thee, saith
the Lord, and thy Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel.
Behold, I will make thee a new sharp threshing
instrument, having teeth. Thou shalt thresh the
mountains and beat them small, and thou shalt
make the hills as chaff. Thou shalt fan them,
and the wind shall carry them away, and the whirlwind
shall scatter them, and thou shalt rejoice in
the Lord, and shalt glory in the Holy One of
Israel. And so you have the Jewish nation, which
has survived over 3 ,000 years. No other people
grew past. This is just God's Word. He's fulfilling
His Word. So you go back to verse 13. Fear not,
thou worm, Jacob. Now, when you think of a worm,
I think of worm fishing. Oh, sure. You know,
let's put this worm on a hook, you know, we're
gonna... It's going to get something, you know.
And so what are worms? What are they? They crawl
under the ground and they eat dirt, you know.
And it's good. They fertilize the soil, you know.
So God is calling Jacob a worm. But he's taking
this worm and he's thrashing a mountain. Right.
And that's what we have seen Israel do. You know,
though all the nations are warring against it
politically. And militarily, I mean, you got
arms from Russia, arms from Iran, you know, and
all that. They're fighting against Israel. And
usually the fights between Israel and their neighbors
are testing grounds for manufacturers of new
weapons, like from the U .S. and from Russia
and China. Very interesting. But we're seeing
many of these nations get thrashed by Israel.
You know, it's very powerful. But so he's taken
this worm and thrashing a mountain. So I go back
to my glow worm. Yeah. So I just, you know, looked
at Wikipedia, you know, and what it says, it's
any member of various groups of insect larva
that glow through the chemical thing while it's
a larva. You know, that's the crawly stage. Yeah,
it's the next stage after the egg. Yeah. The
egg hatches into a larva, and the larva eats
and eats, and then it becomes an adult. Yeah,
and, you know, a caterpillar wraps himself in
a cocoon of green goo and turns out this magnificent
butterfly, you know. So anyway, so you have the
glow worm. But this worm is not an adult stage.
Right. It's in its infancy. Or maybe teenage
years. Or maybe teenage years, but, you know.
But it glows, you know. Wow. You know, so if
you actually go to Isaiah chapter 60. Yeah. And
it's, Arise, shine, for the light has come, and
the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee. Behold,
the darkness shall cover the earth and gross
darkness the people, which we are seeing on all
fronts. But the Lord shall rise upon thee, and
his glory shall be seen upon thee. So arise,
shine. Yeah, be a glow worm. Let your light shine.
Be a glow worm for Jesus. When our light touches
God's light, there's an explosion. Yeah, that's
true. You know, kind of like when conception
takes place. They've seen under a microscope
when the egg and the sperm connect, there's an
explosion of light, just a flash of light. Yes.
And boom, life has started. Yes. You know, so
even though sometimes we might feel like we're
worms, you know, we felt, man, I just really
blew that. Real good. I remember one of the first
times I ever preached, we were in Taiwan, and
I'd been saved. you know, like four or five years,
four years, maybe, you know, and so all of a
sudden I'm preaching in this church in Taiwan
and I'm kind of struggling through it. And I
see Sister Gwen kind of got her head down and
thought maybe repenting for having me, you know,
I felt like a worm trying to glow. I'm really
trying to glow, you know, you know, but I'd been
a backslider for years. I knew the lot of things
in the Bible, but I didn't know a lot of scriptures.
But you have to start somewhere. Exactly. I mean,
we all start like a glowworm. Right. You know,
no matter where you come from, how high your
education, you can have all these degrees and
all that, but all of a sudden you're put in front
of a bunch of people and your notes just get
blurry and you get stage fright, you know, or
maybe something along those lines. But, you know,
as we grow in the Lord. That's how we get our
wings. Amen. You know, sometimes you have to
go through a cocoon different times, you know,
in order to get... Can I add something about
the worm? Yeah, go ahead. So I looked up the
word from Isaiah 41 and verse 14, where it's
talking about the word worm, and it's the Hebrew
word tola, and it is referring to a certain worm,
a certain... one in particular. It can also mean
maggots and things like that. But it is referring
to this certain female, and I'm going to try
to say the Latin name of it, Coccus illicis.
And it is a worm that, it's called the scarlet
worm. And when she's ready to give birth, you
know, to lay her eggs, she attaches herself to
the trunk of a tree. And it's a permanent detachment,
like, this is it. I'm going to die here. And
she lays her eggs and covers them with her body,
and then she dies. And as she dies, this crimson
fluid comes out of her, and it stains the tree.
And that was what the ancient people would use
in antiquity for a scarlet dye. They would collect
these little bodies of these female worms. And
that was the crimson stain. So any place where
you see in the scripture where it's talking about
scarlet and making the tent of meeting the tabernacle
in the wilderness, they're looking for scarlet
thread. It comes from this worm. So there's something
about the idea that she lays down her life and
it's like she's covering with the blood. So it's
kind of a picture of Jesus that came to give
us life. And gave his life for us and the power
of his blood covering us. I just think that's
such a beautiful picture. So that's one way that
the Lord can use this worm to thresh a mountain
by the blood of Jesus. Yes, amen. So back to
where you were going. I'm sorry for the bunny
trail, but I thought you'd enjoyed that little
piece. So that's kind of a nice thing. You're
sitting by this nice campfire, you know. I feel
like a glowworm, you know. And what I realized
through this, you know, it's like it's a time
of celebration, Sukkot, you know. And actually
when they put the tent up or they put their sukkah
up and they always have a spare place sitting
there. Yeah. And that's for Elijah. Right. And
I remember when earlier years on a Friday night.
at our devotions around the table at Ingletal
here. You know, we would have dinner and Sister
Gwen would have her basket of letters. And we
would have this book, Tales of Elijah. You know,
this is from Jewish folklore. Yeah, that's a
good way to put it. And some very, very interesting
things. That is just... Really major thing. So
they would always have a place for Elijah to
sit if he just happened to show up. Because everyone's
expecting that in the last days, Elijah's going
to show up and lead the hearts of the fathers
to the children and the hearts of the children
to the fathers. Some of the last scriptures in
the Tanakh, it's Malachi. So I had to kind of
get my perspective right. When you start thinking
of fishing, more than I do than getting away
with God, something has to change to kind of
get you on course. So this was kind of God's
way of doing it. Close the campground, water
levels are high, no fish, and then to put the
icing on the cake. After we get back, I thought,
well, we'll get up there soon, maybe again, or
maybe for a day. I get this notice sent from
my nephew. that two of the hatcheries that we
have that provide all the trout for the rivers
here, one got flooded bad and another had real
bad water in it. And all fishing, all the way
from the last dam down the river to where we
go, you cannot keep any trout. You have to turn
them all loose. That hatchery, all the fish were
poisoned and they died. Yeah, that's the one
right where we camp. It's just magnificent. hatchery,
and they got some nice -sized trout in there.
Oh, it's beautiful. And the river they release
them in, it's not very wide, and they'll let
people like under 16 or handicapped with a barbless
hook catch and release these magnificent trout.
I mean big trout. I wonder if those were killed
too. Possibly, unless they're all just in the
river. They might just stay in the river, but
they tend to go up in there. And it's just like
there's no new trout, and they provide trout
for the lakes all and the rivers nearby. Could
be years before there's good fishing again. So
we may end up going back to that same campsite.
Who knows? Because even this campsite where we
always go, it's noisy. And people are right here
next to each other, and it's a noisy campground.
So I kind of enjoyed where we were. The quiet.
And I thought, well, maybe if fishing's lousy,
maybe we'll just go back there again. But God
had to change my whole perspective on that. Yeah.
But one thing I was really studying in this book
about revival, too, is God gives us gifts, all
the gifts of the Spirit and that. And there's
an emphasis on the gifts. You're very strong.
Yeah. Many churches, a lot of them, they're in
the prophetic, and you have the word church,
and you have the apostolic church, you have the
bishops, you have all these titles and all these
things. And many of them, they strive in that
stream. But there is one thing that has to happen
to make those actually flow to what they're designed
for, and that's to have the love of God. Very
true. And the Lord quickened me to 1 Corinthians
12. And I'm going to start in verse 6 here. This
is in the Passion Translation. Oh, okay. Yeah.
The same God distributes different kinds of miracles
that accomplish different results through each
believer's gift and ministry as he energizes
and activates them. Make a note of that as he
energizes and activates them. With a capital
H. Yeah. They don't have a capital H here. It
should be, though. Yeah. In our opinion. In our
opinion. We're backseat translators. So every
believer is given continuous revelation by the
Holy Spirit to benefit not just himself, but
all. And verse 8, for example, the Spirit gives
to one the gift of the word of wisdom, and to
another the Spirit gives the gift of the word
of revelation knowledge. And to another, the
same Spirit gives the gift of faith. And to another,
the same Spirit gives gifts of healing. And to
another, the power to work miracles. And to another,
the gift of prophecy. And to another, the gift
to discern what the Spirit is speaking. And to
another, the gift of speaking different kinds
of tongues. And to another, the gift of interpretation
of tongues. And we see these being activated
and used today. Remember, this is verse 11, it
is the same Holy Spirit who distributes, activates,
and operates these different gifts as he chooses
for each believer. You know, and then it goes
on, just as the human body is one, though it
has many parts that together form one body, so
too is Christ. For by one Spirit we all were
immersed and mingled into one single body. And
no matter our status, whether we are Jews or
non -Jews, oppressed or free, we are all privileged
to drink deeply of the same Holy Spirit. Amen.
All the different denominations. It's one Holy
Spirit. There's only one. And it goes on saying,
if I'm not a hand, I'm not part of the body.
Or if I'm an ear to say, since I'm not an eye,
I'm not really part of the body. You know, that
goes on all the, you know, speaking in different
ways. But we need the whole body. Your whole
body has to function to function perfect. You
know, what it's designed for. Exactly. You know,
like you better have two eyeballs than one. You
know, because you get focus. Right. Depth perception
with two eyeballs where you don't get with one.
And every part of our body, you know, is designed
to do something. And the same it is in the body
of Christ with all the gifts, you know, and when
they all flow together, you're going somewhere.
Right. But too many times, just like we read
in the moves of God, flesh gets in the way. Pride
gets in the way. Yeah. So things are not going
to really work as well as they could. So let's
go down to verse 27. and the title here is One
Body with Different Gifts. You are the body of
the anointed one, and each of you is a unique
and vital part of it. God has placed in the church
the following, first apostles, second prophets,
third teachers, then those with gifts of miracles,
gifts of divine healing, gifts of revelation
knowledge, gifts of leadership, and gifts of
different kind of tongues. Now, we know people
that operate in all of these. To a certain extent,
you know. For others, it's just their focus.
Verse 29, not everyone is an apostle or a prophet
or a teacher. Not everyone performs miracles
or has gifts of healing or speaks in tongues
or interprets tongues. But you should all consistently
boil over with passion in seeking the higher
gifts. And these are good. You know, this describes
all this in this whole chapter. It talks about
the gifts. But really what caught my eye was
this last verse. And now I will show you a superior
way to live that is beyond comparison. And that
goes immediately into chapter 13. And many times
when we're reading the Bible, we'll read a chapter
a day or two chapters, and they'll get to that
point and they will stop. And they'll start a
next chapter the next day not realizing this
is a continuous letter. Right. I just want to
point out that when I was young and, you know,
I was raised in the church. When I was a child
and thought as a child. Yeah, that's part of
that chapter. But I learned chapter 12. I learned
about the gifts. And I think probably even before
I heard about the gifts, maybe back in my Baptist
days. I learned about the love chapter. It's
the love chapter. Chapter 13 of 1 Corinthians,
it's the love chapter. And you just talk about
love, and it's about love, and it's about love,
and love, and love. I mean, if you do this, but
you don't have love, da -da -da -da -da. All
you need is love. Well, that was another story.
Anyway, I never saw until, and please excuse
me, maybe you always saw it. Maybe, listener,
you always saw it, but I was absolutely dumb
about this, that I didn't really see it until
Philip brought it out. I understood that last
verse, yet I show you a more excellent way, and
you just move into love. And love is the more
excellent way, but I never saw it before that
it's referring to those gifts of the previous
chapter. I hadn't seen it, and it just became
profound to me. that you can go on with where
you're going, but it was profound to me to realize
that it's talking specifically about those gifts
and operating them without love. Yeah. So when
we continue with the chapter 13, so it goes right
from what we were reading in chapter 12 on to
13, and it says, I show you a more excellent
way. And so then it goes, if I were to speak
with eloquence in earth's many languages and
in the heavenly tongues of angels, yet I didn't
express myself with love, my words would be reduced
to the hollow sound of nothing more than a clanging
cymbal. And if I were to have the gift of prophecy
with a profound understanding of God's hidden
secrets, if I possessed unending supernatural
knowledge, if I had the greatest gift of faith
that could move mountains but have never learned
to love, I am nothing. If I were to be so generous
to give away everything I own to feed the poor
and to offer my body to be burned as a martyr,
without the pure motive of love, I would gain
nothing in value. It goes on speaking, you know,
all these marvelous things of love. And in verse
8, love never stops loving. That's good. We'll
pause right here a minute. In the Greek, there's
three words for love. And the love, this is agape.
You know, it's more like the God love. Would
you want to, you have it right there. Yeah, I
have it right here. The word agape. What's nice
about the Hebrew Greek key study Bible. Yes.
So the word agape, agapau is to love. That's
the verb. So this is the, this is the noun. It
is translated charity, meaning benevolent love.
It's benevolence, however, is not shown by doing
what the person love desires. but what the one
who loves deems as needed by the one loved. For
instance, God so loved the world that he gave.
He gave not what man wanted, but what man needed
as God perceived his need, namely his Son, who
brought forgiveness to man. God's love for man
is doing what he thinks best for man and not
what man desires. It is God's willful direction
toward man. But for man to show love to God,
he must first appropriate God's agape, for only
God has such an unselfish love. Isn't that beautiful?
Beautiful. So that's agape love, which is what
we press into. But it comes from him. You have
to get it from him. And then there's the filial
love, and that's the love like you have to each
other. That's a brotherly love. It's where the
Church of Philadelphia, that's where that comes
from, Filio, the Church of Brotherly Love. Yes.
One of the seven churches of Revelation. Right.
And even Philip is a lover of horses. Yeah. I
love the white horse that Jesus is coming on.
There you go. That's the one I love. And I remember
there was even a church in Chicago that was part
of our chain, if you want to call it. That was
the Philadelphia Church. And then there's another
word, eros, which is the love like a husband
to a wife. But in our English word, all that
is combined in one. And what are, and we don't
listen to it, but what are 90 % of all the songs
you hear on country and western stations? Love
or lack of it or lost it. A lot of stations.
A lot of the music is all about love because
it's really important to people. It's important.
And it strikes people when they're going through
something because music is emotionally very strong.
It works on your emotions. And especially when
you use the title love. And there's so much music
is based about it or what happened when I had
it and lost it and said goodbye to it and getting
it back again. You know, play your LP record
backwards. You know, in country western, you
get your car back, your dog back, you get your
house back. Get your wife back. Get your wife
back. Yeah. That's a joke. That's a joke. So
moving right along, we're back in verse 8 here.
So love never stops loving. It extends beyond
the gift of prophecy, which eventually fades
away. You know, I have a thought about that.
It eventually fades away because eventually all
prophecy will be fulfilled. Fulfilled, uh -huh.
And then there's no more need for prophecy. And
if it's of God, it will be fulfilled. Exactly.
And if the vision will tarry, wait for it. Exactly.
Some visions take a long time. Okay. So it is
more enduring than tongues, which will one day
fall silent. Yeah. You know why? Because when
we get to heaven, we'll speak thought to thought.
Yeah. Yeah. So love remains long after words
of knowledge are forgotten. And, you know, it's
kind of like that theme song that came out of
the Titanic, My Heart Will Go On. You know, and
when a loved one dies, sometimes, you know, people
have been married for a long time. Oh, yeah.
The spouse will not survive. That's true. And
they die very quickly because, you know, even
an animal sometime, if the dog's master passes
away, the dog a lot of times just goes in the
morning. Sometimes they die of a broken heart.
And some people will never recover it all their
life from the loss of love of a loved one. So
love is powerful. Can I stick something in here?
Yes. Well, I think it's important to share this
little testimony that Pastor Tony Kemp shared
of a couple that he knew, and the husband passed
away, and the wife was mourning, and then she
had a dream. And in her dream, she saw her husband.
Might have been a vision. But she saw her husband
in heaven worshiping the Lord. And she walked
up behind him. He became aware that she was there.
He turned around and hugged her. But it was a
hug more like a brother -sister hug. It wasn't
a husband -wife. It was a filial hug. Yeah, it
was a filial hug. And then he turned back around
and he went back to worshiping again. And the
Lord spoke to her and said, whatever his name
is, let's call him Charlie. Charlie has... a
new life. You need to get one too. And she came
back and she woke up from that dream or the vision
or whatever it was. And her heart was really
healed from the loss of her husband because she
realized that God had given her something that
she could work with. You need to get one too.
So in this little moment when we're talking about
lost love, if you have had that experience where
you're mourning the loss of someone, that person
has a new life, and you need to get one too.
That's very good. Wow. So I'll go on in verse
9 here. Our present knowledge and our prophecies
are but partial, but when love's perfection arrives,
the partial will fade away. When I was a child,
I spoke about childless things, for I saw things
like a child and reasoned like a child. But the
day came when I matured, and I set aside my childish
ways. For now we see but a faint reflection of
riddles and mysteries as though reflected in
a mirror, but one day we will see face to face.
My understanding is incomplete now, but one day
I will understand everything, just as everything
about me has been fully understood. Until then,
there are three things that remain, faith, hope,
and love. yet love surpasses them all. So above
all else, you know, and this is above all the
other gifts. Yes. Let love be the beautiful price
for which you run. And when we get the love of
God, the love of Jesus in your heart, it will
help to perfect the gift that you are walking
in. It says like, be ye perfect as I am perfect.
You know, Jesus spoke those words and it really
is be complete. Like I am complete because we
are complete in him. Exactly. Paul says that.
So every gift we have must come through complete
in Jesus for it to be accurate because you don't
want to give a prophecy to something that's tainted.
Right. And if you're not walking right. and you're
prophesying, you know, you could be given tainted
prophecies because if there's other voices speaking
to you, that can go into your prophetic word.
It's true. You know, so the greatest of these
is love. And if we go over to Matthew chapter
22 real quick, you know, so, you know, Jesus
has the last word. Yes. That's what I would say.
And in Matthew chapter 22 and verses 36 to 40.
Of course, you know, Jesus always gets confronted
by the Pharisees and the Sadducees, and they're
always trying to catch him to say something that
they can take back to put fuel in the fire of
the chief priests and all that. So one of them,
a lawyer, asks a question, tempting him, saying,
Master, which is the great commandment in the
law? And of course, they know what the great
commandment is, but they want to hear his interpretation.
Jesus said unto them, Thou shalt love the Lord
thy God with all thy heart, with all thy soul,
all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment.
And the second is like unto it, thou shalt love
thy neighbor as thyself. On these two commandments
hang all the law and the prophets. On these two
commandments hang all the gifts. Oh, that too.
Yeah. That's well put. So we hang everything.
Amen. Amen. And if you don't have the love of
God and you're operating in the gift without
the love of God, you're going to hurt people,
you know, and you're going to do things and say
things that you shouldn't say. You know, there's
this thing about some people that have a gift
of prophecy that have used it unlawfully, I would
say. by saying, okay, if you'll give such and
such an offering, I'll give you a prophecy. I
mean, that's just totally wrong motives. That's
not how you do it. But if you have a gift, you
can operate in the gift, but don't operate in
the gift without the love of the giver who gave
you the gift. You have to operate in that love
of God because that is his nature. I mean, the
book of 1 John says that, verse John 4, 7 and
8 says that God is love. In verse 8, I think
it is. And so it's his nature. If you look at
the fruit of the Spirit at the same time that
you're looking at the gifts of the Spirit, the
very first one from Galatians chapter 5, the
very first one is love. So it's the first, most
important thing. And if you go all the way back
to Sinai, where Moses is up on the mountain with
God. And, you know, he said, show me your glory.
And the Lord comes to him and covers him in the
cleft of the rock. And he roars his name. And
his name means the one who was and who is and
who is to come. Yehovah! And so he roars it twice.
And when you have something twice in Scripture,
in the Hebrew, it's like multiplied. Like, for
instance, when you say perfect peace in English,
it's really shalom, shalom in Hebrew. So when
he roars his name, he's saying, I was, I am,
I always will be what I am. I was, I am, I always
will be what I am. It's like more than doubling.
It's like multiplication, exponential multiplication.
And so he roars his name and then he says. The
first thing he says about him is from the word
racham or rachum, and that comes from the same
root word as the word womb, a woman's womb. So
God's womb, it's like womb love. It's like the
love that a mother has for her baby. You know,
I've only had one pregnancy. We just have one
child. But there's something that goes on in
a mother. During this pregnancy where you're
just being knit to that baby. And in reality,
they have found that the mother's DNA remains
in the child and not just the DNA that makes
them. But the mother's actual DNA is still floating
around in the child and the child's DNA is in
the mother. So there's a connection there that
is so strong. A mother's love for her child,
no matter what the child does wrong, mom can
see the good. Like the mother saying to the judge,
oh, no, no, he didn't mean to hurt that guy.
Grant that my two sons will sit with you on your
throne, one on the left, one on the right. So
the first thing that God says about himself on
Mount Sinai is that he loves, that he loves like
a mother. You know, we think of him as father,
but first thing he says about himself, more so
than a father love. Father love is wonderful,
and father love is powerful and important, but
there's something about mother love that, you
know, you hear these stories about men, soldiers
dying on the field, and they're crying out for
mom. Crying out for mom, yeah. Yeah. Mommy! You
know, there's something about that. connection.
And that's why it's so important when we're learning
about the gifts. And, you know, we came up into
the charismatic mover. I did. And you kind of
joined a little bit later. But you were there.
You saw it happening. And your parents were full
on in it. But there's something about the charismatic
move that we were focusing on the gifts. Really
focused. I can't tell you how many sermons I
heard about the gifts from chapter 12 of 1 Corinthians.
Over and over and over, we were focusing on the
gifts. And in chapter 14, you read it. It says,
you know, covets to my prophesy. Prophecy, just
go for prophecy. Prophecy is so important. You
need to learn how to prophesy. But this place
of love that you read about in chapter 13, I
was stunned to realize that as I kind of dug
into this after you started bringing this message.
this idea of speaking with tongues. You know,
speaking in tongues is the first thing that we
focus on. You know, the baptism in the Holy Spirit
with the evidence of speaking in tongues. I'm
not against that. I'm for that. But you have
to get it from the lover of your soul and connect
with the lover of your soul as you speak in tongues.
One of the things that I've been doing recently
is really focusing, because it's easy to speak
in tongues mindlessly without your mind being
on it. And there's a time and place for that,
to just be continuously praying in tongues. But
when I really want to connect, I say, Holy Spirit,
pray through me. Holy Spirit, pray through me.
That Romans 8 prayer, because we don't know how
to pray as we ought to. And that love that comes
with it, it's a different experience praying
in tongues with the Holy Spirit. But if we just
pray in tongues without the love of God, what
are we accomplishing? It's just noise. And then
having the gift of prophecy. But this little
line here, it says, understand all mysteries.
As I was looking up the gift of the word of wisdom.
The word wisdom there is Sophia in the Greek,
and it also indicates wisdom, and it's well translated
as wisdom, but it also indicates understanding
mysteries. So I didn't know that understanding
mysteries actually goes with the word of wisdom.
Great. Okay. And having knowledge. Well, that's
the word of knowledge. That's the gift of the
word of knowledge. But if you don't have love
and having faith, it's a gift of faith. so that
you can move mountains. I mean, there's a real
story about that. But if you don't have love,
when it says, it profits me nothing, it means
that there's no eternal value. And the eternal
value comes from receiving the love of God so
that you can operate in the love of God. And
that's where maturity comes. You're going to
step into that place of maturity where your gift
is actually introducing the one who loves. That
it's not about the pride, like that's what you
were talking about at the very beginning. The
pride that stops a move of God. It causes the
move of God to ebb. It's the love of God that
keeps it going. When you're filled with the love
of God, you're not going to be standing up in
pride because the love of God recognizes his
greatness. And it causes us to humble ourselves
in his sight and walk in that awe and reverence
of him that will cause his name to be known.
When we don't take any of the credit ourselves,
when we don't take any of the glory ourselves
and we give him all the glory, that's what keeps
revival going. That's what brings this revival
where there will be no ebb. Let's just close
with that prophecy that Arthur Burt wrote the
whole book about. It was a prophecy that he heard
given in Manchester, England in the 1930s. No
one's exactly sure of whether it was 34 or 35
or 39 or whatever it was. But this is the quote
from his book. It shall come as a breath. And
the breath shall bring the wind. And the wind
shall bring the rain. And there shall be floods
and floods and floods and torrents. And torrents
and torrents. Souls shall be saved like falling
leaves from mighty oaks swept by a hurricane.
Arms and legs shall come down from heaven, and
there shall be no ebb. And he remembered later
that there was also a part about where the rich
and the poor will embrace each other on the streets
of New York City. Wow. Wow, wow. You know, that's
love poured out. That is love poured out. You
want to close with prayer? Yeah. Well, Father,
we thank you for these words, Lord, and the words
that you give. And, Lord, that the greatest of
these is love. That, Father, that in our quest,
O God, for more of you, that, Lord, you would
be the focus of it all. You would be the center
of it all. And that, Father, we can fulfill our
plan that you have for us in earth, O God. Yes.
And, Lord, by loving you, because when we love
you, Lord, with everything that we have, with
all our heart, mind, and soul, we will be walking
out our destiny. So we just pray, Lord, I pray
for all our listeners that, Lord, they would
find their destiny, Lord, that only comes from
knowing you intimately, oh God. Lord, many things
are handed down, but Lord, to truly know you
will be the fulfillment of it all. So we thank
you, Father, and we just bless each one listening
and give you all the glory. In your name, Lord
Jesus, amen. Amen. Check out our website at globaloutpouring
.org to find out more information, read our blogs,
connect with us, and donate. You can also browse
our web store for life -changing anointed books.
Until next time, this is Sharon Buss. And I'm
Philip Buss. God bless you with His overwhelming,
loving presence.