I chanced upon this draft of my introduction to CLP Talk No. 9 - Receiving the Power of the Holy Spirit. This was circa 2003.
"Good evening.
Tonight, my brothers and sisters, is a historic night.
Tonight can be, for you all, a turning point….
A turning
point in your lives as individuals.
A turning
point in your lives as couples, as husbands and wives
A turning point in your family
lives,
A turning
point in your lives as members of the church.
This is because, tonight, my brothers and sisters, God, out
of His love for us, is offering a continuing invitation. He is inviting us to
live a life in the Holy Spirit…. starting now, here, in this Church.
This
is the reason why, we should know, by heart, what Life in the Holy Spirit
means. That was what Talk No. 8 is all about. To make sure, then, let us all try to review and recall Talk No.
8.
I invite you my brothers and
sisters to recall our past sessions.
In Module 1, we talked about
: THE BASIC TRUTHS ABOUT CHRISTIANITY
1. God's love
2. Who is Jesus Christ?
3. What it means to be a Christian
4. Repentance and faith
Now,
allow me to ask you, after going through all those sessions – four Saturdays of
three hours each –
Can
you claim, in all sincerity, that you have understood them all?
Can
you claim that you have comprehended those teachings and even believed in them?
Can
you in all sincerity say to yourselves – Yes, I know God’s love, I know Who
Jesus Christ is, What it means to be a Christian, I know Repentance and Faith.
Brods, you may be intelligent, you may even have studied
those matters better than the speakers here did, but on your own, you
could not have appreciated those talks. You could not have comprehended
them. Relying on your own intelligence
and skills and talents and on your own power of analysis, those talks were just
simple lectures: you heard them, you analyzed them, and then forget them in the
future. Para kang nanood lang ng TV.
The
same is true for Module 2: THE AUTHENTIC CHRISTIAN LIFE. In Module 2, we talked
about --
5. The Christian ideal: loving God
6. Loving your neighbor
7. The Christian family
8. Life in the Holy Spirit
Now, allow
me to ask you, after going through all those sessions – four Saturdays of three
hours each –
Can you now
love God with all your heart, your soul, and your strength?
Can you
love your neighbors in the manner that the Good Samaritan loved that wounded man
by the roadside?
Can you
claim to have established a truly Christian family?
Brods, to
be frank about it, you must be saying, “Impossible naman yang sinasabi ng mga
speakers, eh! ” Kahit siya mismo di niya kayang gawin yung tinuturo niya!
Yes, that comment is true. Both you
and your speakers, on your own steam, on your own strength, on your own
power, you cannot love God and your
neighbor in the manner as set forth in the Greatest Commandment! On your own steam, on your own skills,
kahit my Ph D ka pa s Theology, you
cannot establish a Christian home! On your own power of analysis, kahit
magtanong ka kay Soriano o kaninuman araw-araw, you could not understand who
the Holy Spirit really is.
Indeed,
whoever claims that they could now practice all the messages from these
talks, using only their own intelligence
and their own strength, is lying !
Why ?
The answer
is: You cannot do it alone. You cannot do it out of your own steam. You need
“one who will come along side you”. In Greek, “the Paracletos” or the
Paraclete. This was how Jesus called and described the “Holy Spirit”
And this, my brothers and sisters,
in essence is what Life in Holy Spirit means.
God is concerned about every aspect
of your life – all that you do, think, and seek to accomplish in life. This is
why He sent His Spirit to be with you. Go to Talk 9."
CLP. 10-24-2003
