Going Beyond the Soul to Spirit — Zac Poonen

I'm always very happy to be here. I remember the days, I first came to Dubai in 1990, 1990 is 25 years ago, and of the people who first met in that conference, nobody is here. A lot of people get offended with what I say, and some of them don't last.

And then I came another time for a conference where we had only two families. And through the years, God has added many people. I'm very happy that this is no longer a Malayalam assembly. A Malayalam assembly is okay in Kerala.

Anywhere outside Kerala, it becomes a club, not a church. I found that consistently. Clubs are united on the basis of a common interest. There are people who join a club to play tennis, or table tennis, or golf, or play cards, or drink, or because they are Malayalis.

The Church Must Be United in Christ

The reason of unity makes no difference. But if anything outside of Jesus Christ, anything outside of Jesus Christ becomes the uniting factor between me and another person, that is a club, it's not a church.

Even, listen carefully, even if the uniting factor is, I enjoy listening to Zak Poonen. That sounds very spiritual, right? It's a club. It's a club of Zak Poonen followers. It'll never be the body of Christ.

God is very jealous. He'll never give his glory to another. So I've seen a lot of people in many parts of the world, even in the United States, say, Brother Zak, we really enjoy listening to your messages and we hear it regularly.

But I say, are you a part of a church somewhere? Have you united with other people who accept these truths and become one with them? No. Because they say, well, there's no church like yours over here.

When I say there's no perfect church in the world, I remember a young man who once came to a godly elder brother and asked him, can you suggest a perfect church that I can join? And he said, that old man, godly old man, he said, I've never found a perfect church in my life.

But if you find one, don't join it. Because the moment you join it, it'll become imperfect. So those people are looking for a perfect church. As soon as they join something, they make it imperfect. The church is a bunch of imperfect people who are pressing on to perfection.

That is the difference between what we emphasize and every church has got imperfect people. Every church in the world, Roman Catholic, Pentecostal, everything. But so people say, well, you're also imperfect and we're also imperfect.

I say, but there is a difference. The difference is, in every message that we seek to preach in our church, we are seeking to press on to perfection. You know, if a bunch of, say, 20-year-old young men say, well, we're all imperfect.

None of us have got a PhD. I say, yeah, okay, none of you got a PhD. But some of you 20-year-old people have finished high school and you're studying in college and some of you 20-year-olds are still sitting in the kindergarten.

Twenty years old sitting in the kindergarten. What's you saying? Oh, that brother is in college, but he hasn't got a PhD. I'm in kindergarten. I haven't got a PhD. So we are the same. We are not the same.

Some have started in the kindergarten and pressed on in 20 years to reach college. Others are sitting in kindergarten for 20 years. That's the difference between saying, we're all imperfect. I would never want to be in a church that's not pressing on to perfection because that is like what Jesus said in Luke 14.

Counting the Cost of Spiritual Maturity

I want you to see this verse. Turn with me to Luke's gospel chapter 14. He says, which one of you, verse 28, when you want to build a tower, does not first sit down and calculate the cost to see if he has enough, or we can also say he may have enough, but whether he wants to spend that much money to build today, instead of tower, we would say a skyscraper.

Here's a man who wants to build a skyscraper. And I want to tell you something, following Jesus is like building a skyscraper. We keep on building floor after floor. Every sin you conquer is one more floor in your life.

It's like in the land of Canaan, every giant you conquered, you occupied his territory. So you're building a skyscraper. But if you want to build a skyscraper, if you want to build a little hut, you don't count the cost.

All of us may have money for it, but you want to build a big building. Many of you have built houses in Kerala. Before you built, didn't you calculate how much it's going to cost and whether you have the money?

And even if you have the money, whether you want to spend it, that is another question. So if they don't calculate, what can happen is, after laying a foundation, it says here in verse 29, he lays a foundation and is not able to finish.

Why is he not able to finish? Because he says, I don't want to spend so much money, I don't want to spend so much money. I say, okay, foundation is enough. And people laugh at him and say, this man began to build, verse 30, he's not able to finish.

This is the condition of, I would say, 95 of born-again believers that I've seen, and I've got 55 years of experience in many, many countries, I've seen believers, 95 are born-again, but they have not gone beyond a foundation.

What is the foundation? Hebrews 6, verse 1, 2 and 3 says, repentance, faith in the Lord Jesus, water baptism, baptism in the Holy Spirit, and after that, resurrection of the dead and eternal judgment.

Turn with me to Hebrews 6 and see that for yourself. What did Jesus mean by laying a foundation and then not doing anything beyond that? It's very important that you see scripture and compare scripture with scripture.

Don't just believe any preacher who cannot show you from scripture. What did Jesus mean when he said somebody makes a foundation and does not go beyond that? Hebrews 6, verse 1, therefore, leaving the elementary teaching about Christ, let us press on to maturity, press on to perfection.

That is how in King James Version it says, let us press on to perfection, complete the skyscraper, not just laying a foundation. And what is the foundation? Listen, read this carefully. Repentance, that means you have given up what you know to be sin, faith, and repentance from dead works means you don't think that you can be saved by doing a lot of good works.

All your good works are dead works, you have repented from trying to save yourself by burning candles or going on a pilgrimage or going to church, you have given up all that or sprinkling child baptism.

Those are all dead works, you have given up all that. You have turned away from all those dead works and you believe faith in Jesus Christ. That's how people are born again. And baptisms, the King James Version, it says baptisms, baptisms means baptism in water and baptism in the Holy Spirit.

You know baptism in the Holy Spirit, by the way, is foundation. In the early church, everybody received it right at the beginning. Today some people teach as if it's some postgraduate degree, it is not a postgraduate degree, it is kindergarten lesson, baptism in the Holy Spirit, to receive the Holy Spirit.

Everyone can receive the Holy Spirit, if you want, unless you close up something in your heart and laying on of hands, that is for spiritual gifts or for healing. But after that, what do you do? What about spiritual growth?

No spiritual growth. After that, you just wait for resurrection and eternal judgment. That's foundation. That means after you have been born again and been baptized, baptized in the Holy Spirit, there is nothing more to do except wait for resurrection and eternal judgment.

But he says it shouldn't be like that. Once you have accepted these things, we must press on to perfection. It's like climbing a mountain. Jesus has reached the top and we seek to follow. So in Luke 14, Jesus spoke about these certain people who only lay a foundation and didn't want to… because they didn't want to pay a price.

Why Churches Must Press Beyond a Foundation

So the reason why CFC was started many forty years ago was because most churches were occupied with only a foundation. We are not saying they are not born again. They were born again. There are many, many churches in Dubai and in many parts of the world that preach a genuine being born again and they are believers.

The only thing is they are not pressing on to perfection. Ten years later, they are defeated by the same sins they were defeated ten years ago. That means they are not pressing on to perfection. It's like you are climbing a mountain, ten years later you are on the same level.

You haven't progressed. Or ten years later, you have still got the foundation, polishing the foundation. You haven't progressed. That is the reason why we decided to move away from churches that did not preach completing the building.

I mean, you would not want to give… if you are building a house in Kerala or anywhere in India, you would not give it to a contractor who just lays the foundation and sits on that for ten years. What sort of contractor is that?

You'd say, hey, I want to change the contractor. Why do you want to change the contractor? He is a good man. People ask, why do you want to change the church? Same reason. Same reason that you will change your contractor.

That's the reason I changed the church. And that's the reason a lot of people change the church. But some people do not change their church for that reason. They come together just because there is a good message there and they are intellectually stimulated.

That's not a good reason. That's not a good reason to join any church. And sometimes God uses an intellectually minded godly man and keeps him in the church with another godly, equally godly person, but who is not intellectual, to test people.

See, for example, the Apostle Paul was a very godly man, but he was a very sharp intellectual man also. Peter was an equally godly man, but he was not intellectual. He was a fisherman, not so educated.

He says in his letter, in 2 Peter 3, he says, Paul writes so many things that are very difficult to understand. He is very honest. He says, my mind is not like his. Peter's letters are very simple. Paul's are very, you know, strong intellectual stuff.

And why does God keep Paul and Peter in the church, two equally spiritual, but one intellectual, one non-intellectual? Because he is testing people. People don't know that. The people who listen to these two brothers, Paul and Peter, they don't realize that God is testing them.

That if somebody only wants to listen to Paul, you know he is not a spiritual man. He is not a spiritual man because he is not attracted to godliness. Because he is attracted to godliness, he listens to Peter also.

He is attracted to intellectuality more than godliness. But he doesn't realize it. But God uses that to test him. See, is this guy interested in explanations and nice presentation of a message? Or is he really godly, hungering to overcome sin?

I have been tremendously blessed through the years. As I have sat, you know, most of our churches are in the villages of Tamil Nadu. And Tamil Nadu villages' elders are not at all educated. Most of them haven't finished even school.

Whereas people in Kerala, even in the poorer places, they have certain amount of education. But I have been so blessed as I have mingled with these brothers from Tamil Nadu who are poor, uneducated. And I have learned things from them.

Because I am not drawn to people on the basis of intellectual ability. It's God who made people different. Something very important for us to understand in the new covenant is that, this is not theory, but I have found through the years, it's very, very practical.

Spirit, Soul, and Body

Let me show you first of all this verse in 1 Thessalonians 5. 1 Thessalonians 5 and verse 23. 1 Thessalonians 5, 23. It is speaking about holiness. Sanctify means make you holy. And he is saying here, may the God of peace, himself make you holy completely.

Entirely means your whole personality. And the whole personality is described here as three parts. Spirit, soul and body. Like God is a trinity, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. When God made Adam in his image, he made Adam also a trinity.

Spirit, soul and body. Three parts, not two parts. There are some Christians who believe there are no three persons in the trinity. Some believe there are only two. But there are three, Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

Man also is a trinity of spirit, soul and body. And this is why when the Old Testament, everything in the Old Testament is a picture of spiritual realities. Like the Passover lamb is a picture of Christ dying on the cross.

They are going into the Red Sea and coming out from Egypt is a picture of water baptism. The cloud coming down from above is a picture of baptism in the Holy Spirit. Everything in the Old Testament is a picture.

And when they came out into the desert, the Lord told them, build a tabernacle. That was another picture. Tabernacle says, I want to dwell among you. And the tabernacle was a picture of man becoming the dwelling place of God.

In the Gospel of John, when it says about Jesus, the Word became flesh. John 1 .14 is referring to Jesus. The Word became flesh. And you know what my NASB Bible margin says? The Word became flesh and tabernacled among us.

That is the real meaning there. Here in this Bible, in my margin it says, when it says dwelt, it means tabernacled among us. So the tabernacle, that's the word the Holy Spirit uses here. The Word became flesh and like a tabernacle of God, dwelt in our midst.

So the Old Testament tabernacle is a picture of man, spirit, soul and body. Just like our body is the only part of us that can be seen, you cannot see my soul and spirit. There are two parts inside me called soul and spirit.

But you can only see the outward. In the Old Testament tabernacle also, if you went there you could only see the outside court that was open. And there were two parts that were hidden under a tent, called Holy Place, Most Holy Place, symbolizing soul and spirit.

It's a very beautiful picture. So once you understand that, then you see that in the Old Testament, God put a thick curtain called a veil between the soul and the spirit. Between the Holy Place, the Most Holy Place and said you can't enter there.

And God dwells there. God wanted to dwell in man's spirit. But there was a thick curtain. Something hindering God from dwelling in man's spirit. That was the message. When Jesus died on the cross, that veil was rent from top to bottom.

Top to bottom means God did it. Saying now the way into the spirit of man is open. God can dwell in man's spirit. Till then, religion was only body and soul. That's all. All the priests could go to the outer court and the Holy Place.

They could not enter the Most Holy Place. That is one of the big differences between Old Covenant and New Covenant. We say in CFC we are a New Covenant Church. If so, we must understand what is the difference between soul and spirit.

Many Christians live in the soul. That's why they never become spiritual. These three parts of man can also symbolize three types of Christians. There are some Christians who are only interested in the body, external things being OK.

They don't seek to purify their soul and spirit. There are other Christians who live in the soul but not in the spirit. There are also Old Covenant Christians sitting in the 21st century. These are things we need to understand.

The Word Divides Soul and Spirit

Hebrews chapter 4, let me show you. Have you ever understood this verse? The Word of God, Hebrews 4 .12. The Word of God is living and powerful, active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to divide soul and spirit.

What does that mean? Soul and spirit are not the same. The Word of God comes and brings a division between soul and spirit. It's only one who understands that who can become a spiritual person. There are carnal Christians who live enjoying things.

They say they are born again, but the body means a lot to them. They are carnal. For example, they don't have any control over their eating. They are careless with their eyes and their tongue. They gossip, they backbite.

Sins of the body clustering in the eyes. But they are born again. And they'll come and sit in a church. They could sit in a CFC church. But they are ruled by their body. And it's possible that some folks are sitting here.

You are ruled by your body, even though you are born again. Your bodily desires control you. And of course, you confess your sin and ask God to forgive you. But you never seem to be able to overcome your bodily desires.

They keep bringing you down, bringing you down. You are like a Christian living in the outer court. You are not spiritual at all. You are born again, you come into the tabernacle, but you are stuck there in the altar of forgiveness of sins.

You are not pressing on to perfection. You are just laying a foundation and stopping there. And then there are some brothers and sisters who decide, these bodily passions are not going to rule me. They fast.

Have you ever fasted? I am not going to ask you to raise your hands. But you ask yourself. Have you ever fasted even for one day in your life? Not when your child is sick and dying. I don't mean that.

Fasting to seek God, to control your bodily passions. When I was a young Christian, I was working in the Navy. You know, young people, bodily passions are very strong. And I said, I don't want to be ruled by my body.

And while I was working on the ship, I would fast. Every week, at least one day, fasting. And I carried that on for many, many years. Because I said, I don't want my body to run my life. Some of you who have a problem with controlling your tongue, or controlling your eyes, try fasting.

Prove to God, I don't want my body to rule my life. So that's one type of Christian who lives in the outer court. Then there is a second type, who is better than that, who goes into the holy place. The second, the soul.

He has overcome his bodily passions. But he is intellectual. He is a soulish person. He is always interested in intellectual explanations of the Bible. You know, the follower of the Apostle Paul. The intellectual answer to this question, that question.

And careful study of scripture. He thinks he is spiritual, because he is studying the scripture. But he is studying the scripture like he studies chemistry. Supposing a man wants to get a PhD in chemistry.

He will analyze chemistry books, chemistry books, and become a specialist. You can study the Bible like that. And you can fool yourself thinking you are spiritual. You are not. You are soulish. You are not carnal.

You are not committing all those terrible sins that other people in your church do. And you can think you are spiritual because you are better than them. But because you don't know what spirituality is, you are soulish and you think you are spiritual.

It's a very, very common mistake. They have not allowed the word of God to bring a division between soul and spirit. They have not understood what it is to go through the rent veil into the most holy place.

Worshiping in Spirit and Truth

Let me show you one verse which teaches that. John chapter 4. In John chapter 4, when Jesus was speaking to the woman of Samaria, there was a discussion about worship. Today, all Pentecostal, charismatic churches talk about praise and worship.

Maybe some of you use that expression too. Praise and worship means the time of singing before the message. Even the Brethren Assembly, we say we are having a worship meeting where we come around the Lord's table.

Even the Anglican church, they call their Sunday services worship services. So all the way from Anglican to Brethren to Pentecostal, they all use this word worship. I'll tell you, I've been in all those churches.

None of them understand what worship is. None of them means none of them. I'll tell you why. Please read scripture. If you know the scriptures, you will not be deceived by all these things. Jesus told the woman of Samaria, in verse 21, she was asking, should you worship in Jerusalem or in that place?

Jesus said, it's not a question of place. It's not a question of this mountain or Jerusalem that you worship the Father. It's not location. It's not this church or that church. Today we would say this.

The Samaritans say it should be here. Israelites say it should be there. Some people say it should be this church, some people say that church. Jesus said, it's not this church or that church. It is a matter of the spirit.

You worship what you don't know. The hour is coming, verse 23. If you really want to understand worship, I want to encourage you to study verse 23 and 24 and ask God to give you revelation on John 4, 23 and 24.

The hour is coming. That means it has not yet come. And now is. How is that? The hour is coming, but it is already here. That means in one sense, it has not fully come. But it's going to fully come, but part of it has already come.

Understand it like this. When the true worshippers, we are talking about true worshippers, will worship the Father, not in the soul, not in the body, but in spirit and in truth. For such people, the Father is seeking to be His worshippers.

I tell you, I got revelation on that. The Father is not seeking for people who worship with their body and their soul alone, but to worship in the spirit. And God is a spirit. He is not body or soul. God is a spirit.

And those who worship Him must worship not in body and soul, but in spirit. You ask 99 of believers what that verse means. They'll never be able to tell you. I don't know if any of you know it. You've read it many times.

But I don't know whether you understand it. I never heard a single message preached on that by anybody in my whole life. God is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him. When I read that verse, I said, Lord, I'll tell you what I said.

Listen to me. Father, verse 23, you are seeking for true worshippers who worship in the spirit. You're looking all over the earth for true worshippers who worship in the spirit. Show me what it means.

Because I want to be one of those. I want to be one of those who satisfies your heart to be a true worshipper. And then I began to understand the difference between worshipping in the body, worshipping in the soul, and worshipping in the spirit.

Supposing you hear that your father wants something badly. Would you have a longing to please your father or not? I have a great longing to please my heavenly father because he sent his only son to die for me.

I said, Lord, if there's anything that I can do to make you happy, I want to do it. And I discovered here, one of the things is, the father is seeking for those who will worship him in spirit. And I did not know what that meant.

So I said, Lord, show me. Show me what I don't know. You've got to be humble when you come to the Bible and acknowledge that you don't know. If you come to the Bible like some expert thinking you know everything, you'll understand nothing.

Come like a little child. God has hidden these things from the clever and the intelligent. He's revealed them to babes. So I discovered that all Old Testament worship was body and soul. There's nothing wrong in that.

In the Old Testament, the veil was there. You couldn't go into the spirit naturally. There was only body and soul. But now that the veil is rent, and you can enter into that place which represents the spirit, man can worship in the spirit.

That's why in the Psalms, you read the Psalms, those are the songs of worship in the Old Testament. Everything is body and soul. Clap your hands, raise your hands, shout, shouting is body. I do it. I raise my hands, I clap my hands, I shout.

But I don't stop there. Soul is that which stimulates my intellect and emotions. Musical instruments and banging and drums and instruments. I believe in that also. And emotion. Sometimes I weep when I praise God.

That is good, but it's all emotion. When I want to go beyond that, I want body plus soul plus spirit. And I have discovered there are very, very few Christians I've seen in my life who have gone beyond body and soul.

Our soul is our intellect and our emotions. And when we worship and we are moved in our intellect and moved in our emotions, you are better than those who are just clapping their hands and raising their hands.

But you still haven't become a worshipper in the spirit. He who has ears to hear, let him hear. The Father seeks for those who will worship in spirit. Because there is only one way to worship in the spirit.

You have to go through the veil. And that is a mystery to many people. What is that veil? Turn with me to Hebrews in chapter 10. I want to show you everything from scripture so that you don't your faith does not rest on somebody's cleverness, not even Zak Kunan's cleverness.

Your faith must rest on scripture. Hebrews 10 .20, 19 and 20. Brethren, we have confidence to enter and this is referring to the most holy place. We have confidence to enter that most holy place by the blood of Jesus Christ and by a new and living way which he inaugurated through the veil.

That means Jesus rent the veil and opened the way. Inaugurated means for us, you know when a new road is inaugurated by some minister or sheikh or someone. That doesn't mean only he uses it. It's inaugurated for the whole population.

That's the meaning of inauguration. A building is inaugurated for people to use. Not just the man who inaugurated it. So when it says Jesus inaugurated a new and living way, he opened it. He cut the ribbon and opened it.

Like people cut the ribbon and open a road or open a building. But it is for people to use. He's inaugurated the way for us. A new and living way inaugurated for us through the veil. And it explains here what the veil is.

That is his flesh. This is a great mystery. A mystery, you know the Bible if you retake a concordance and read the word mystery or mysteries in the New Testament, it comes a number of times. One mystery is called the mystery of godliness.

A mystery is a secret of God that God has to reveal to your spirit to understand it. You can't understand it by study. What you can understand by study is not a mystery. Chemistry is not a mystery. If you have a clever mind, you can understand it.

Physics and science and mathematics are not mysteries. If you have a clever mind, you can understand it. But some things in the Bible are a mystery. That means you don't understand it unless God reveals it to you.

Peter was not a clever person. He may not have got a PhD in science or mathematics, but he could understand the mystery. Because Jesus said, to you it is given to know the mysteries of God's kingdom. Because God reveals.

To whom does God reveal his secrets? You know that you don't tell your secrets to everybody. Certain secrets you may tell your wife or your husband, but you won't tell everybody. Some secrets you don't even tell your children.

You reveal secrets to those who are closest to you. You know to whom God reveals his secrets? Psalm 25. Psalm 25, it says, verse 14. Psalm 25, verse 14. The secret of the Lord is for those who fear him.

Fear means reverence him. Who have a tremendous reverence for God. The fear of the Lord is to hate sin. There is a verse like that in the book of Proverbs. The fear of the Lord is to hate evil. Are you one of those who hate sin in your life?

Hate it? That's one proof of the fear of God. God reveals his mysteries to those who hate sin in their private life. See, I can appear to be very holy coming here to CFC. In fact, some people say, I don't want to be a part of a dead church, I want to be a part of CFC.

And they get a reputation and a name. I'm a part of CFC, I'm not a part of some dead church. That doesn't mean you fear God. That depends on your private life. If you don't hate sin in your private life, you don't fear God.

Even if you sit here forever. I've sometimes said to CFC in Bangalore, some of you will go to hell. Because you don't fear God. You come here because this is a good church, you like to hear the messages, people are very kind and helpful and nice and all that.

But you will go to hell finally and your blood will not be on my hands because I told you straight. I've told some people in CFC, you are not born again, I want to tell you that. Yeah, it's quite likely some of you sitting here are not really born again.

Quite likely. Please think of it seriously. If you hate sin, then you know you are. But if you don't hate sin in your private life, and you alone know that, if you can sit in front of a computer and watch filthy pictures, don't tell me you hate sin.

Don't fool yourself that you are born again. I seriously question it. Turn from sin, fear God and God will then reveal the mysteries to your spirit which cannot be understood by your soul. He will reveal it to your heart and that will change your life.

That will be revelation. What we have in the mind is called understanding. You understand with your soul, but you get revelation in your spirit or in the heart. And we must seek for revelation. So, one of the mysteries is 1 Timothy chapter 3 and verse 16 is called the mystery of godliness.

You know, we just read in Hebrews 10, the veil symbolizes the flesh of Jesus. Which was rent. And the mystery of godliness is that Jesus was revealed in the flesh. But He was pure in His spirit. That is a mystery.

How can someone who has a flesh keep his spirit pure? You and I have a flesh. How can you keep your spirit pure? That's a tremendous mystery. Jesus came in the flesh and kept His spirit absolutely righteous and pure.

He was declared righteous in the spirit. And even the angels saw that, it says here. But that is a mystery. And when you understand it, that is the mystery of godliness. Or the Living Bible says, it is true that the way to live a godly life is a secret.

But the answer lies in Christ, who came to earth like us and lived a holy life. The answer is there. That is why my life was changed when I understood this and I began to study the earthly life of Jesus as my example.

Crucifying the Flesh by Denying Our Will

So what does it mean that Jesus came in the flesh? In very simple terms, He did not have a sinful nature. The Bible says very clearly, we have sinful flesh. He did not have sinful flesh. He came in the flesh, but not sinful flesh.

There was no sin in Him. Not at all. Not even from birth. The angels said to Mary, this holy thing is going to be called the Son of God. So when we say Jesus had a flesh, what it means is He had something called My Will.

And when it says Jesus had to crucify the flesh, He had to crucify My Will so that He could do the Father's Will. That is the meaning of crucifying the flesh. And if you never understood it till now, at least you understand it now.

But if you understand it, it doesn't mean you'll do it. It's only here. I'll show you where it says that Jesus crucified His flesh. John chapter 6 and verse 38. John chapter 6 and verse 38. This is Jesus Himself saying.

Now we would say Jesus came down from heaven to die for the sins of the world. That's not what He says. Listen carefully. Why did Jesus come down from heaven? You ask the average Christian, why did Jesus come down from heaven?

99 of people say He came from heaven to die for the sins of the world. No. That is one part of it. He says, I came from heaven to do My Father's Will and to deny My own Will. In other words, to crucify My flesh and to please the Father.

That is why He came down and in the list of those things that He did, one of the items is dying for the sins of the world. That's not the only thing. It's one among hundred things, dying for the sins of the world.

But what is the total list denying My own Will and doing the Father's Will every day for thirty-three and a half years. For example, when He was a little boy and His Joseph and Mary tell Him to do something.

And you know, a little ten-year-old boy, you know, you have ten-year-old children or five-year-old children. They want to do something on their own. And you tell them, no son, do this. And it is a struggle for them.

They say no. We have all faced children who say no or I'll do it later. Never once did Jesus say that. He wanted to do what all five-year-old and ten-year-old children wanted to do but He killed that thing called My Will.