Pastor Brian – Welcome
1. Good morning, everybody. Nice to see those of you, maybe you had to brave a little weather to get in. It’s good to see you here today. It’s good to have those online. I apologize if I am a little stuffy and squeaky. I left here last week with a cold, I kept it throughout the week, while I was in the USA. I was doing a little better and I think I got it back on my way home yesterday. So, I made it in last night and I’m happy to be with you here today. I would appreciate your prayers, not only for today, but I have to get back on an airplane tomorrow. I’ll be in Egypt for ministry during the week, and then I’ll be back here on Sunday. And I would appreciate a touch of the Lord. Amen. Why don’t we just stand together.

Emmanuel – Reading the Word
1. We’ll be reading 1 Corinthians 13:1-7, “If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.
Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.”

Pastor Brian – Communion and announcements
1. We’re going to prepare, it’s the first Sunday of the month, we’re going to have communion today. So, if we could just have our ushers come forward. Now the communion represents the place where we celebrate the sacrifice of Jesus. Through the sharing of the bread and of the wine. We recall his body and his blood. Given for the forgiveness of sins.
2. Aren’t you glad you’re forgiven? And if you might be here and ask, I don’t know if I am or not. Just take a moment and speak to him. God loves you. He has reached out his hand and his heart to you. Lord, we just look to you today. We thank you, Lord, that you have forgiven us of everything past. We thank you that you forgive us today. And that, Lord, you carry us in forgiveness throughout our lives and into eternity.
3. This thing that we’re about to do, it’s a visible representation of God’s grace. That little piece of bread or cracker and that little thumbnail of wine or juice, it’s a visible reminder of God’s love. And it’s a reminder that he has made covenant with you. And then beyond that, it represents the unity that he has brought us into as his people.
4. Just look across the room really quick. You have been unified with each of these people in Christ. His body is our body; we are his body. His blood is our blood. And it runs through us. So, we take this not only to express our fellowship with God, but to celebrate our relationship with each other. We are so many different kinds of people in this room. Just the few we are today, we’re so many different kinds of people. Literally gathered from all over the world.
5. But what this represents is that none of those differences matter. So, when we take this communion, we break down every barrier of race. We break down every barrier of class, of wealth, or of status. So, to you and to each one of your neighbors, you are welcome at this table.
6. And then finally, it represents our eternity. We have the hope, not just the hope, but hope as in expectation of eternal life. So, when you take the communion today, let it nourish your soul. Let it strengthen your faith. Let it renew your commitment to live with Jesus. And as we’ll hear in a little bit, renew your commitment to live in his way.
7. So, Lord, as we prepare to take this communion, I pray today this prayer of renewal. Let us be found once again in you. Let us rejoice in you today again, all over again. Because you are in us, and we are together in you. In Jesus’ name. So, as they finish passing this out to those who’ve come in, just do this again.
8. We’re going to hear a little testimony today. I think this is a good time. So, Alexandra, I would like to ask you to come and share with everyone what you shared with me last Sunday.

Alexandra – Testimony
1. I’m standing here just to testify about something that happened a week ago here during the service. Pastor Brian had the conviction in his heart that he should call some people. The Holy Spirit was calling some people to submit a prayer. So, that moment we have Leto, who submitted the first prayer.
2. And I was standing there and I was fighting with myself because I knew I have to pray something, but I didn’t have the time, the time I mean to have the prayer because Rebecca came very soon. So, I thought, okay, I don’t have to. So, during these moments, actually seconds I knew the subject. God had given me two words, and he gave me the word of Breaker and the word of Keys.
3. But I gave up. I didn’t do anything. At the very end of the service, Pastor Brian comes back with the same subject I have. I know in my spirit somebody should pray, but he didn’t. You’ve had so strong the conviction about this, and you have expressed it for too long, I mean, during the service. So, I thought, okay, he repeats the same, but I’m not going to do anything. I don’t know how to do it.
4. And what did I do? I went to Angelos. I said to Angelos, I have this in my heart, I know. And he said go and let Pastor Brian know because it’s good encouragement for him to know that the Holy Spirit spoke to him. So, I did it. Yeah, I did because pastor Brian had the conviction that this is a prayer that the one who’s going to pray needs that prayer, plus he’s going to bless the rest of the church.
5. And actually, I was the one that needed first. I was really, really, really overstressed for a couple of months. So, I was going to the Lord and was saying how long all these little prayers, but he wanted to remind me, awake and go that he’s the Breaker. So, he reminded me that he breaks the walls. He breaks every wall in our life. He breaks every wall that is standing before us. And he doesn’t break it because the wall is already broken since he was on the cross.
6. So, he’s reminded that it was just to give me the right perspective that everything has been won on the cross. And then he comes and says to me, and I use this because you have to remind her that I have given you the keys of the kingdom of heaven.
7. So, whatever you bind, it has already been bound in heaven. And whatever you release, it is already being released from heaven because of the cross down on earth. (A footnote. It is from the Holy Spirit that this interpretation is given in this order: it is already bound and released in heaven before it happens on earth. This follows what the Lord said in the Lord’s prayer, “Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” See the order?)
8. So, in the name of Jesus Christ, we bind and we break everything that is standing against us. And we are releasing the grace of the Lord God Almighty. We are releasing his solutions. We are releasing his freedom. We are releasing his deliverance. We are releasing all the goodness that the heaven has for all of us because we have the keys, but we are not using them.
Pastor Brian
9. I think she wants to preach this morning. Let’s just all together take somebody’s hand or reach a hand up or out or do it however you want to express your prayer this morning. But Lord, we’re just going to receive this word together today. You are the God who breaks every chain. And Lord, anything that the enemy has brought toward us to try to bind us and confuse us. Anything that would try to hinder our relationship with you or stand in the way of our faith. In the name of Jesus, we just receive and cast those things off of us today. We declare that you are the God of breakthrough. And that Lord, you are the God who provides the keys to the kingdom. You open every necessary door. And you close those that should be shut. And because of this, Lord, we declare our praise for you. We glorify you. Because the only power that resides in us is that of your Holy Spirit. So, Lord, we receive from your Spirit today. And we declare freedom, deliverance, hope, provision, and victory in Jesus’ name. Amen.
10. Well, we’ve been talking about the gifts of the Spirit. We’ll go back into that passage in 1 Corinthians 12 next week. But we don’t want to just talk about the Holy Spirit. We want to see him released to move among us. Let the Lord use you with his gifts so that the body can experience all that he wants to bring.
11. Just a few simple announcements. Don’t forget Wednesdays, we have 7 o’clock prayer, 7.30 Bible study. We have prayer every morning, Tuesday through Friday at the church, 10 o’clock to 11 o’clock.
12. And if you’re not yet participating in a care group, one of our home group settings, please become a part of one. This is a way that we can better strengthen one another and celebrate one another. So, if you don’t know when and where those are, talk to Leto or myself, or Anton. And we will be glad to help direct you to one.
13. Amen. Children? Do we have children? Welcome back, Korina! I won’t make them come up for prayer today. I think they’ve got a good thing going in the back.
14. Brother Anton, I’m going back in time now. Brother Anton will be bringing us the word this morning. But before he comes, let’s just prepare our hearts. And declare again the goodness of God. You can stand, you can sit, you can move, you can do whatever you want. Within the boundaries of Spirit-led order.

Anton – Main Message
1. Thank you, pastor Brian. You are welcome to sit down if you want to. I just want to remind all of us to continue to pray for pastor Brian and pastor Gail. With all their travels and all their responsibilities, they care for us a lot. And we also have the responsibility to care for them as well. So, I want to ask that you will constantly pray for them.
2. Last week pastor Brian started a two-part series on the manifestation gifts. And hopefully he will continue with that next week. But to give him a little break pastor Gail asked that I step in today. And this morning we’re going to talk about a different gift. A gift that all of us who believe have received.
3. There are a few gifts that all of us have received. The gift of salvation. The gift of faith. The gift of grace. And the gift of holiness. But the gift of holiness is a little bit different from the others. Holiness is not just a gift that we receive. But it’s also a command. God called us to be holy. And he calls us to be holy. And so, we’re going to read a few verses from Romans 6. I hope the English and the Greek is similar.
4. We’re going to look at the concept of holiness today. And not as much on the passage. But this week in the care groups, in the home groups, and Wednesday at our Bible study, we’re going to focus on the text of Romans 6 more in detail.
5. So, if you want to hear the second part of the sermon. I want to invite you to come to one of the care groups or to our Wednesday evening Bible study. So, as we have the Bibles open before us. Let us pray together.
6. Father, we thank you for the many gifts that you give us. We thank you Lord for the gift of salvation. We thank you that you gave your Son Jesus for us. We thank you Lord for the gift of faith. That we can believe that Jesus is your Son. We thank you Lord for your Word. That through your Word we can know who you are and what you have done. And we thank you Lord for your Holy Spirit. For it is He that breaks your Word open for us. I pray Lord that we will read. That we will hear. That we will see. And that we will understand what you want to teach us today. That we will apply to our lives. And live as your holy people. As you have called us to be. Thank you, Lord Jesus, that we can pray this in your name. Amen.
7. So, we’ll read Romans 6:19-23. “I am using an example from everyday life because of your human limitations. Just as you used to offer yourselves as slaves to impurity and to ever-increasing wickedness, so now offer yourselves as slaves to righteousness leading to holiness. When you were slaves to sin, you were free from the control of righteousness. What benefit did you reap at that time from the things you are now ashamed of? Those things result in death! But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God, the benefit you reap leads to holiness, and the result is eternal life. For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
8. We’ll read to this point. What does it mean to be holy? Holy is a term that we use very often as believers. And when we talk to Christians from other traditions, they may have different understandings of what it means to be holy. Especially what it means to be a holy person. We have different understandings of what it means to be a saint. And therefore, it’s important for us to understand what does it mean to be holy.
9. In the Bible we find two words that refer to holiness. The Hebrew word is kadosh. Meaning to be set apart. To be distinct. To be consecrated. To be sacred. And in the Greek, you should teach me that. It is agios, meaning to be separated from common use. It means to be devoted to the divine. It means to be pure.
10. And many then summarize the definition of holiness. It means to be someone or something, to be set apart. Set apart from the common, from the ordinary, but for a specific purpose. For God’s purpose. And so, it is those two points that we usually refer to. To be separate, and to be dedicated.
11. And so, in the Old Testament, there are a lot of references to being holy. And the holiness or the reference to the holiness is not just towards the people. But also, to things. The tabernacle, the temple. And the articles within the temple. Those articles were separated from the things that the people used outside of the temple, and they could only be used in the worship of God.
12. But when we think of holiness, it is most of the time just a moral thought. That person is holier than thou, he’s holier than others. Because he lives a certain way. But not doing the wrong, doesn’t necessarily make you holy.
13. I know that the book of Leviticus may not be your favorite book in the Bible. We don’t preach a lot from Leviticus. We don’t read it a lot. But Leviticus is an amazing book. Because it focuses on God’s holiness, and our holiness. God called the people of Israel to be holy because he was holy. “Be holy because I am holy”, God says.
14. And when we read carefully through the book of Leviticus, we clearly see there are three categories of being. Or three categories of doing. We usually think there’s two, but there are three. We read about the unclean. The things or the actions that are against God’s law. And then there are the clean. Those things that are not unclean. That are not against God’s will.
15. But we are not called to be clean only. To stop doing the wrong. We are called to be holy. Not just to do the right things. But to be separated from the rest of the world. And be fully dedicated to God.
16. So, we usually teach our children and new believers. These are the things you should not do, and these are the things you can do. But we should also teach everyone, this is the life that we are called for. And this is the life dedicated to God. Not just to avoid the bad. Not just to do the good. But called to be holy.
17. When we talk about being holy, we can never just talk about holiness of people, apart from referring to our holiness in the light of God’s holiness. So, what does it mean that God is holy? God is totally different from all other things. God is absolutely unique.
18. Sometimes when I look at YouTube videos, about space, I love science fiction, but I’m very fascinated about space. And they tell us that there are billions of galaxies. And every galaxy has billions of stars. My mind cannot fathom how big the universe is. But if we think of everything that exists, what we can see, and what we cannot see, God stands apart from everything else.
19. God alone is holy. When we say God is holy, we mean that He is absolutely different from everything else. Think about that. God is unique. He’s infinite. He’s eternal. Nobody created Him. And He is perfect in every way. Nothing can compare to Him. That’s what it means to be holy.
20. We read in 1 Samuel 2:2. “There is no one holy like the Lord; there is no one besides you; there is no Rock like our God.” God alone is holy. But when we say that God is holy, we also say that God is moral perfection. Everything that God does, He does because He is pure. Because He is right. Because He is just. His love is a holy love. His power is a holy power. His wisdom is a holy wisdom. In God there is no darkness. There is no deceit. There is no wrong in God. God is good. And that makes Him holy.
21. We also read that with God’s holiness comes His glory. Out of His holiness radiates His glory. God’s glory is the visible expression of His perfection. When we sing about God’s glory, we praise Him because He expresses His holiness. And His holiness radiates throughout creation.
22. And when the angels observe God, what do they do? They fall down before Him. And what do they say? Holy, holy, holy is the Lord. They don’t say great is the Lord. They do not say lovely is the Lord. They say holy is the Lord. Because He alone is holy.
23. And when we read in the Bible when something is repeated, we know it is an important thing that the author wants to stress. But when something is repeated three times, it means it is of ultimate importance. And so, the angels cry, holy, holy, holy. Because in God’s holiness, His whole being is expressed. And we are invited to also fall down before God, and say, with conviction in our hearts, that God alone is holy.
24. So, what does it mean that God alone is holy? Revelation 15:4 refers to the fact that God alone is holy. God is holy in his essence. God does not possess holiness. God is holy. You will never be able to separate God from his holiness. That’s his very nature. That’s the definition of who he is.
25. And therefore, when we look at God’s command for others to be holy, we know that we can never be fully holy like God is holy. But we can only participate in his holiness. Our holiness reflects God’s holiness. And it comes through a relationship with him. And it comes through the gift and the command from him.
26. Therefore, nothing can be holy if it’s not called to be holy by God. And it reflects his holiness. We can talk about holiness in other religions. But we can never see that as true holiness. Something can only be holy if it truly reflects the beauty and the holiness of the eternal God.
27. And therefore, as we participate in God’s holiness, what does it mean when God says, “Be holy as I am holy?” We go back to Leviticus again. And in a few places, God tells the people, “Be holy, for I the Lord your God, I am holy”. We see that God does not say this as a random fact. But he says this as part of his Covenant with his people. It’s only within the Covenant with the people that God can call his people to be holy. God decided to go into a relationship with his people. And part of that relationship is to share his holiness with the people. But it’s not only in that relationship. But it’s also in the reflection of his character.
28. God calls us to come out of the world into his world. To be set apart, but also to reflect his character, his being, back to the world. The people of Israel had to be different from the Egyptians and the Babylonians and the Canaanites. God took them out of the world to make them his people, but also to send back to the world, to reflect his holiness to the world.
29. What does it mean to be holy? It means to be like God in a world that is not for God. It is to reflect his character. It is to reflect the ethical decisions that we make. It is to live differently from the rest. Not just to be good, but to be good with a reason.
30. To be good so that others can be blessed through that. It is good as God is good. And therefore, when we say we are holy, because God is holy, we build our holiness on God’s holiness. We can only be holy as far as God is holy. God’s holiness flows through us, his people, into this world. And therefore, holiness is not just a calling to be, but it’s also a calling to go out to be. It is a gift that comes from God and it’s a gift that goes into this world. So, God alone is holy, but he calls others to share in his holiness.
31. And so how do we become holy? There are three realities that Scripture teaches us. There is a positional holiness, our position. We are set apart for God; at the moment we start to believe in Jesus. We become holy when we are born again. That is a position that all of us share.
32. But the second reality is it’s also a progression. We are being made holy as the Spirit transforms our character. (This process is called sanctification.) We have received the holiness, but we don’t live it out yet.
33. But there is also a third reality. The perfected holiness. That is when we will be fully holy. (This is called glorification.) When we see Christ face to face, when he comes back, or when we die, we will be holy as he wants us to be holy.
34. So how do we see this step by step? Like any other gift, our holiness is a gift of God. It is God’s grace through faith in Christ. We cannot decide to become holy, when we begin to believe in Jesus as the Son of God. Like the grace of faith and salvation, we also receive the grace of holiness. It is the gift of holiness.
35. Through faith we become holy. But God also gifts us with his Holy Spirit. And so, our holiness can only come when the Holy Spirit indwells in our lives. When he changes our hearts, our characters, our being. When he renews our minds and he produces the Holy Fruit.
36. So, it comes through faith. And it comes through the Holy Spirit. But we continue to grow in God’s holiness when we obey God’s Word. In John 17:17, Jesus says, “sanctify them by the truth. Make them holy through the truth. Your Word is truth”. The more we read and believe God’s Word, the more we become holy as we are intended to be holy.
37. We also continue to be holy when we separate ourselves from sin and the sinful world. When we do not become part of this world, but our lives are dedicated to God, away from the world and devoted to God.
38. But it also flows out. Through the fruit of the Spirit. When we show love; when we show mercy, humility, goodness. We reflect God’s character, God’s holiness. And that’s when we are holy in this world. When our lives become a blessing to the church and the world outside. It is to be holiness in action.
39. But it also comes through perseverance. And through discipline. It is through the choices we make daily. It is through the spiritual disciplines that we practice. It is through the accountability to one another, that we learn what it means to live as holy people.
40. And so, we come back to the last two verses of our text. Romans 6:22-23. “But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God, the benefit you reap leads to holiness and the result is eternal life. For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus, our Lord”.
41. We’ve been taken out of this world. We’ve been separated from the sin. We came into a relationship with God. Paul says we’ve become slaves of God. So that we can reap, so that we can gain the holiness God has given us. And with that, the eternal life. God has called us. He has given us holiness. God has called us to be holy for Him and for this world.
42. Let us pray. Father, we thank you for your holiness. That you are separate and different from anything else. We know, Lord, that we are very different from you. But we are so grateful that you’ve called us into a relationship with you. To be holy as you are holy. Give us the strength, Lord, to be apart from this world we live in, and live fully for you. We thank you, Lord Jesus, that with you, we can be holy and be holy to this world. And it’s your name we pray. Amen.
43. If you want to pray with somebody, if you don’t have a relationship with Jesus, if you don’t know what it means to live for God, or if you want the Lord to give you more faith, and a better understanding to be holy, then I’m going to invite you when we finish here to stay behind. And we’ll be in front here to pray with you to ask the Lord to bring you into His holiness and to go out in this world as holy people.

Pastor Brian – Closing off
1. Thank you, Anton. It’s good to have a holy God. It’s good to be called into His holiness and to learn to better and better, better reflect His holiness. Something not done in our own power. But rejoice in the fact, where Anton started today, holiness is a gift. The Holy Spirit is empowering us every day to move toward that reflection.