Forrest: We are in the second week of our series breakout, and today's message is called Spirit Breakout.
Forrest: And before I go further, can we just thank this worship team this morning for leading us to the throne?
Forrest: Adam and Noel and their crew as we say, You are my everything of God.
Forrest: We want to be faithful.
Forrest: We want a people want to be a people who are faithful to God, who are filled with faith, who are full of faith in Christ, and in doing so, see the Spirit of God break out.
Forrest: And God is on the move.
Forrest: I just have to tell you that this last Sunday, last week, was uh record attendance here at Multiply on a Sunday.
Forrest: God is moving.
Forrest: And faith is rising.
Forrest: And this verse, that's a linchpin verse for this series, Hebrews 11, verse 6.
Forrest: It says, and it is impossible.
Forrest: Everybody say impossible.
Forrest: Is it impossible?
Forrest: It is impossible to please God without faith.
Forrest: Anyone who wants to come to him must believe that God exists and that he rewards those who sincerely seek him.
Forrest: Our God that wants to break out and bring breakthrough in our lives as we truly and genuinely seek him, that he just wanting and waiting to bless us and to restore us and to reward us.
Forrest: When we're filled and full of faith, it's impossible to please him without it.
Forrest: It makes me think of the image of a bride and a groom standing at the altar and as they're exchanging vows, the groom standing behind, standing across from his bride and having his hands behind his back with his fingers crossed.
Forrest: Nobody does that.
Forrest: Nobody does that because the point and the goal is you as you step into this relationship of marriage is for you to be faithful, not unfaithful, not faithless.
Forrest: In the same way, there are so many people who say, I believe in God.
Forrest: But in 2025, we have to ask the question, what God are you referring to?
Forrest: See, because Jesus is the Son of God and the only way to God.
Forrest: Jesus is not Buddha, Jesus is not Allah.
Forrest: Jesus said of himself that he's the only way to the Father in John 14, 6, when he said, I am the way, the truth, and the life.
Forrest: No one comes to the Father except through me.
Forrest: Jesus is specific and he's exclusively God, and he's not sharing the throne with anybody.
Forrest: See, there's uh in the Ten Commandments, when God says to have no other gods before me, the reason he has to give us that instruction is because there's other options that we can divide our hearts and our loyalties towards.
Forrest: But Jesus, he's the one true God.
Forrest: And we can't just waver and go back and forth and straddle the fence between Jesus plus something else.
Forrest: We can't say, oh, I believe in God, but then I also bow down to astrology and what the stars have to say about my life.
Forrest: I can't say, oh, I believe in God, but then I also bow down to crystals that I think that has divine power that I put in places in my house that I'm supposed to be getting some kind of divine entity and divine power from.
Forrest: You can't say, oh, I believe in God, but then also bow down to your political party platform.
Forrest: You have to submit to Christ.
Forrest: You have to say, I believe in God, but not bow down to a sexual sin that is helding you back and strangling you out and tangling and entangling you and keeping you held down.
Forrest: James, the half brother of Jesus, he tells it to us plainly about straddling the fence and having divided loyalties in James chapter 1, verse 6.
Forrest: He says, But if you ask him, be sure that your faith is in God alone.
Forrest: Everybody say God alone.
Forrest: Do not waver, for a person with divided loyalties is as unsettled as a wave of the sea that is blown and tossed by the wind.
Forrest: Such people should not expect to receive anything from the Lord.
Forrest: Their loyalty is divided between God and the world, and they are unstable in everything they do.
Forrest: How long will you waver between two opinions?
Forrest: See, our Jesus is the King of kings and the Lord of Lords.
Forrest: He's not the universe.
Forrest: Out here, people praying to the universe.
Forrest: No, we know the creator of the universe.
Forrest: We don't worship the created three thing.
Forrest: We worship the creator Christ.
Forrest: And as we jump into the second week of this series, as we're looking at the most famous or one of the most famous prophets in all of the scripture, Elijah.
Forrest: Elijah that we met last week in 1 Kings chapter 17, where we were introduced to Elijah as he's on the scene about 900 years before Christ, when the people of God, the Israelites in Israel, were in this sixth cycle of rebellion and following and being uh being pulled away by false idols and false gods and divided loyalties, and then God raising up a prophet, someone who speaks for God to correct them and to speak judgment and for then God to then judge them and then to then turn their hearts back to God, and they just continued on in this cycle over and over and again, and in some ways we're still in this cycle.
Forrest: And Elijah, when we met him last week, we see him as he is stepping into this office of prophet at the time where there has been a string of evil kings and Israel.
Forrest: And these evil kings, the one that's most evil thus far, is the king that is right in front of Elijah, King Ahab, with his evil wife, Queen Jezebel, who's come from the north from Sidon.
Forrest: And when she came from the north, she brought with her the wicked, demonic worship of a false god named Baal.
Forrest: This was the worship of this deity that people would worship as the storm god to have rain and for them to be able to grow crops and fertility.
Forrest: And this went so far to the point that Ahab the king actually built a temple to Baal in Israel, and people were going there, and this was not just common every day.
Forrest: You think about it, 2025 worship.
Forrest: No, the the worship of Baal included human sacrifice, including child sacrifice and temple prostitution.
Forrest: And there was a there was a wickedness and a demonic spirit that was now being worshiped in God's land by his people.
Forrest: And Elijah is called up to speak the judgment of God and to call people to repentance.
Forrest: Elijah, last week we saw him go before the king and proclaim that there will be a drought in the land, that there will be no rain, that God would prove that he's actually the one who hung the stars and dictates the weather.
Forrest: And we saw Elijah as he went through a series of miracles of dependence on God in the Creef ravine, where he was fed miraculously and then helped a widow for her house to be fed in the middle of this drought and famine, and leading to him, even as her son died, for him to, in filled with faith, to pray over this boy to be resurrected, and for the first time in the scripture, someone is raised from the dead by the faith that Elijah had.
Forrest: And we pick up the story at the next chapter in 1 Kings chapter 18.
Forrest: And so you have your Bible, please turn there with me.
Forrest: If you have your phone, please pull it out so you can know where this story is in the scripture, 1 Kings chapter 18.
Forrest: We're gonna start in verse 1, as Elijah goes before the king.
Forrest: Verse 1, later on in the third year of the drought, the Lord said to Elijah, Go and present yourself to King Ahab.
Forrest: Tell him that I will soon send rain.
Forrest: So Elijah went to appear before Ahab.
Forrest: Then skip down to verse 17, where he sees Ahab.
Forrest: When Ahab saw him, he exclaimed, So it's really you, you troublemaker of Israel.
Forrest: I have made no trouble for Israel, Elijah replied.
Forrest: You and your family are the troublemakers, for you have refused to obey the commands of the Lord and have worshipped the images of Baal instead.
Forrest: Now summon all of Israel to join me at Mount Carmel, along with the four hundred and fifty prophets of Baal and the four hundred prophets of Asherah, uh, who are supported by Jezebel.
Forrest: Verse 20.
Forrest: So Ahab summoned all the people of Israel and the prophets to Mount Carmel.
Forrest: Then Elijah stood in front of them and said, How much longer will you waver, hobbling between two opinions?
Forrest: If the Lord is God, follow him.
Forrest: But if Baal is God, then follow him.
Forrest: But the people were completely silent.
Forrest: Then Elijah said to them, I'm the only prophet of the Lord who is left.
Forrest: But Baal has four hundred and fifty prophets.
Forrest: Now go and bring two bulls, and the prophets of Baal may choose whichever one they wish, and cut it into pieces and lay it on the wood on their altar without setting fire to it.
Forrest: I will prepare the other bull and lay it on the wood on the altar, but not set fire to it.
Forrest: Then call on the name of your God, and I will call on the name of the Lord.
Forrest: The God who answers by setting fire to the wood is the true God.
Forrest: And all the people agreed.
Forrest: And then to verse 26.
Forrest: So they prepared one of the bulls and placed it on the altar.
Forrest: And then they called in the name of Baal from morning until noontime, shouting, O Baal, answer us.
Forrest: There was no reply of any kind.
Forrest: Then they danced, hobbling around the altar they had made.
Forrest: About noontime, Elijah began to mock them.
Forrest: You'll have to shout louder.
Forrest: He scoffed.
Forrest: For surely he's a god.
Forrest: Perhaps he's daydreaming or relieving himself, or maybe he's away on a trip, or is asleep, or needs to be wakened.
Forrest: So they shouted louder, and following their normal custom, they cut themselves with knives and swords until the blood gushed out.
Forrest: And they raved all afternoon until the time of the evening sacrifice, but still there was no sound, no reply, no response.
Forrest: Now let me back up a bit.
Forrest: Elijah goes before the king and he's placed before the king to be a spokesperson of God and to proclaim that there's no rain, and that then led to this holy showdown between him and the prophets of Baal.
Forrest: But before all of that, what happened to Elijah was that God took him in the place of preparation and prayer.
Forrest: See, last week we talked about how God took Elijah to this grief ravine, this cutting place, and had him to give his full dependence on God.
Forrest: And so before Elijah was ever in the palace or ever in public ministry or ever saying anything, his heart was prepared and given over to God.
Forrest: It was prepared for him then, filled with faith for him to step out and to see God do the miraculous.
Forrest: But you're wavering between two opinions, and your loyalties are divided between God and your sin.
Forrest: And what you need to do in the same way that Elijah did to these prophets is that you need to rebuke it.
Forrest: See, Elijah stepped up to them and he said, Where's your God?
Forrest: Is he taking a trip?
Forrest: Is he asleep?
Forrest: Is he going to the bathroom?
Forrest: Is he relieving himself?
Forrest: He calls out and he rebukes this counterfeit faith that the prophets of Baal had.
Forrest: And we need to rebuke the counterfeits that are in our life as well.
Forrest: That's my first point.
Forrest: Rebuke the counterfeit.
Forrest: Now, I I started off with this point as rebuke the stupid.
Forrest: But then I then I went to rebuke the demonic, and then I softened it up for y'all for rebuke the counterfeit, okay?
Forrest: See, you can't have your cake and eat it too.
Forrest: The Israelites are calling on this demonic, false God, and it's the Lord Himself in the Ten Commandments that said that you shall have no other gods before me.
Forrest: That wasn't a suggestion.
Forrest: That was a commandment.
Forrest: It was a reality.
Forrest: You don't have it both ways, you don't straddle the fence.
Forrest: You call out the things in your life that the enemy is trying to tempt you with and pull you away and have you believe false doctrines and false beliefs.
Forrest: And what social media wants you to do and want you to believe.
Forrest: No, you rebuke it in the name of Jesus and you say, Satan, get behind me.
Forrest: You have no power in my life.
Forrest: You open up your mouth in the preparation of prayer and you say, Get behind me.
Forrest: You speak it out and declare it.
Forrest: Look at what Elijah does next.
Forrest: Verse 30.
Forrest: Then Elijah called the people, Come over here.
Forrest: And they all crowded around him, and he repaired the altar of the Lord that had been torn down.
Forrest: And he took twelve stones, one to represent each of the tribes of Israel, and he used the stones to rebuild the altar in the name of the Lord.
Forrest: And then he dug a trench around the altar large enough to hold about three gallons.
Forrest: And then he piled wood on the altar and cut the bull into pieces and laid the pieces on the wood.
Forrest: And then he said, Look at this, fill four large jars with water, and pour the water over the offering and the wood.
Forrest: And after they had done this, he said, Do the same thing again.
Forrest: And when they were finished, he said, Now do it a third time.
Forrest: Twelve jars.
Forrest: Remember, it's a drought right now.
Forrest: So they did as he said, and the water ran over the altar and even filled the trench.
Forrest: Verse 36, at the usual time of the offering, the evening of the evening sacrifice, Elijah the prophet walked up to the altar and prayed, O Lord, God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, prove today that you are God in Israel, and then I am your servant.
Forrest: Prove that I have done all this at your command.
Forrest: O Lord, answer me.
Forrest: Answer me, so these people will know that you, O Lord, are God, and that you have brought them back to yourself.
Forrest: Verse 38.
Forrest: Immediately the fire of the Lord flashed down from heaven and burned up the young bull, the wood, the stones, and the dust.
Forrest: It even licked up all the water in the trench.
Forrest: And when all the people saw it, they fell face down on the ground and cried, The Lord, he is God.
Forrest: Yes, the Lord is God.
Forrest: Elijah sets the altar, and he goes and he grabs twelve stones to rebuild the altar of God.
Forrest: These 12 stones representing the twelve tribes of Israel, God's people.
Forrest: That at the time, if you know in the book of Kings, this is the point, and this is the time where the kingdom of God had fractured and split into two pieces and the southern territory of Judah and Israel to the north, and the people of God were fragmented.
Forrest: And Elijah goes and he rebuilds the altar of God to show them who the one true God is, and as their divided loyalties, that God wants them to be his people again.
Forrest: And then he steps up and he says, He says so plainly what he wants for the Lord to do in verse 37.
Forrest: He says, Oh Lord, answer me, answer me, so these people will know that you, O Lord, are God and that you have brought them back to yourself.
Forrest: You may be in the room right now, and at one point you were following God or are closer to God, but now your faith has grown cold.
Forrest: Can I tell you?
Forrest: God wants you to come back to him.
Forrest: He wants you to return back to him.
Forrest: See, you may have walked into the room today, and there's things that are trying to keep you from God, relationships, sin, things that maybe a lifetime of walking away in the other direction from God, just like his people then, he's calling and saying, and saying, Come back to me.
Forrest: Do you know anybody who walks through the doors of this church is new, not is not too far gone for God to reach them?
Forrest: There is nobody who walks through these doors that has sinned too much, who has done too much, that God will not give them grace and love them and forgive them and bring them home.
Forrest: The Bible is filled with people who walked from God or were so broken, murderers, and the love of God is just calling and saying, Come back, come back, come back to me.
Forrest: We, as the believers in Christ, we need to be the ones like Elijah to rebuild the altar in our hearts.
Forrest: That's my second point.
Forrest: That we be the ones to rebuild and to come back to God and to put off the sin that is holding us back.
Forrest: And for us to rebuild the altar of God so that he will move.
Forrest: But you know what?
Forrest: You cannot manufacture a move of God.
Forrest: You you need to rebuild this altar in your house and rebuild this altar of your heart, that God would make you his dwelling place, that he would be at home in you, in your heart, and then for God to break out from there.
Forrest: Anybody remember a couple of years ago the Asbury revival that happened?
Forrest: I got to go and attend there a couple of times, and it was this amazing move.
Forrest: And obviously, lots have been said, a lot lots has been said about that time and what happened, the calm and the reverence that was in the room.
Forrest: And I was there and I felt it.
Forrest: This this revival, this outpouring that happened primarily in Gen Z that is so distracted and so filled with anxiety that this revival it wasn't crazy, people weren't running around.
Forrest: Literally, it was reverent because God was bringing Himself and what this Generation needed of peace.
Forrest: And a couple of hundred thousand people flowed through that revival in the course of a couple of weeks.
Forrest: But do you know how it started?
Forrest: Do you know how it began?
Forrest: Actually, a friend of Multiply, Zach Meerkreebs, Pastor Matt Zach Meerkreebs, who's who's preached here at Multiply before, he was serving as a as a chaplain there at Asbury, and that day he'd been asked to speak at chapel, and to his own admission, he said that uh his his sermon was no good.
Forrest: He was kind of going it rolling in on two wheels and was kind of piecing it together.
Forrest: And at the close of this chapel service, Zach called for these college students to confess and repent of their sins.
Forrest: And students began to come forward and to confess their sins to one another and to repent.
Forrest: And then it just kept going and it kept going and it kept going and it kept going.
Forrest: This is why, because listen to me, repentance is the start of revival.
Forrest: Turning back to God, seeing God as your everything, and turning your heart and moving towards Him and leaving your old life behind.
Forrest: And Elijah calls down fire from heaven and it burns up the bull and the altar and everything into ashes, hot fire.
Forrest: And the people they proclaim and they turn their heart back to God and saying, The Lord, He is God.
Forrest: Yes, the Lord is God.
Forrest: But these wicked prophets of Baal, they meet their ultimate judgment and death.
Forrest: These wicked priests and priestesses who had turned God's people away from him and had pulled his people into the wicked worship of Baal, they meet their end.
Forrest: Verse 40, then Elijah commanded, seize all the prophets of Baal, don't let a single one escape.
Forrest: So the people seized them all, and Elijah took them down to the Keshan Valley and killed them there.
Forrest: Now what did we think about this now?
Forrest: How did Christ think about this?
Forrest: I want you to fast forward in your mind 900 years later, where Jesus is in the middle of his ministry.
Forrest: He's heading now to head to the cross, and he's set his face on Jerusalem.
Forrest: And he's traveling in this same region of Samaria where Mount Carmel is, right on the edge of Samaria.
Forrest: Mount Carmel, which is means garden, the mountain garden, hearkening back to the Garden of Eden.
Forrest: And in the same area, Jesus is walking with his disciples, and the people in that area are hard-hearted again.
Forrest: And in Luke chapter 9, verse 52, he sent messengers ahead to Samaritan village, to a Samaritan village to prepare for his arrival.
Forrest: But the people of the village did not welcome Jesus because he was on his way to Jerusalem.
Forrest: Then James and John saw this and said to Jesus, Lord, should we call down fire from heaven and burn them up?
Forrest: But Jesus turned and rebuked them.
Forrest: And they went on to another village.
Forrest: Jesus turns to his disciples and he rebukes them.
Forrest: He corrects them harshly.
Forrest: He speaks to them because what's in their mind, they're really feeling themselves.
Forrest: Oh God, do you, Jesus, do you want us to call down fire from heaven and kill these people?
Forrest: And Jesus looks at them and says, Don't kill anyone because I'm on the way to die for them.
Forrest: Not so that just bad people can be turned good, and not just so that people who aren't religious can become religious, so that people who are spiritually dead can be made alive by Jesus' death, burial, and resurrection and giving you his resurrection power.
Forrest: And we need to join Jesus in reviving the dead.
Forrest: That's my third point.
Forrest: Revive the dead.
Forrest: For you to step out and see the spirit break out in your life and then move to other people's lives as well.
Forrest: See, we no longer want the enemies of God to die because Jesus is the one who died for them.
Forrest: We step out in faith and we we see those who come to Christ and we turn our hearts to God and personally we we rebuke the counterfeits and the mnemonic in our lives and we rebuild the altar of God to see God move and we step out and the Spirit breaks out.
Forrest: And it's Jesus who, because of his great love, wants none to perish, but all to come to repentance, to follow him.
Forrest: And I imagine in a room that is this size that there are so many of us that have let sin entangle us, ensnare us, and divide our loyalties, and we need to repent and rebuild the altar of God in our hearts.
Forrest: And in a room this size, there may be some people in here that you have not yet moved from spiritual death to life because you've not yet received and been revived by the resurrection power that Jesus granted to you in your place by his death and his blood on the cross and his resurrection power walking out of the grave.
Forrest: But today is the day.
Forrest: Today may be the day for someone in this room to receive him as Savior, to be forgiven and set free, to be healed, to be in heaven, in the kingdom of God here on earth and into this next life.