Saturday, November 9, 2013

You Shall Receive Power

"But ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you: and ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judaea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth."

Acts 1:8

Within your own abilities and resources you are powerless; you couldn’t overcome, you couldn’t sustain and you couldn’t bear without the presences and power of God… I state this to reinforce the message from today’s focus verse… Jesus informs His disciples that they are to standby and wait for the arrival of the Holy Ghost before proclaiming the good news throughout the world… We need the Holy Ghost to share the good news to a loss and scattered generation; many have fallen into diverse temptations and have even lost sight of God’s promise and plan because we believed in our own power and were simply overpowered by the storm or circumstance that we faced…  You are called to witness and bring reconciliation between God and His creation; however, you cannot jump into action without first being equipped for duty… This is the grave mistake that we too often make, we have a zeal for God so much so that we move before His command and end up being rejected like Saul or running into the enemy’s territory like David… Jesus says ye shall be witnesses… You will have a story to tell, you will have a testimony to share and you will be given an opportunity to add your personal brick to the building of God’s kingdom; the thing you must understand is that there is a process that must be adhered to before you begin applying your bricks… The Holy Ghost is our guide, compass and power; we have to have the spirit of God living in us in order for the will of God to be carried out through us… This world can be a treacherous place and one of the biggest detractors to our walk of Faith is seeing a fellow believer become victim to society or circumstances because they were not prepared to face them… This is the difference between a praying man who has lost everything and a man who has turned to the streets to try and save his home… When the spirit rest upon you, you can rest in the will of God knowing that His plan is perfect and that you will reach His expected end… There are many mistakes that we can make in this life, giving into temptation, associating ourselves with the wrong people or even just denying the truth; however, one of the mistakes we often make which is never really discussed in our Christian journey is the mistake of moving before God calls you too… In the book of Acts the disciples were given specific instructions as it pertained to their life after Christ death and ascension; one of these instructions was simply to be patient and wait for the comforter… One can only imagine what must have been going through the disciples head, Jesus had died and rose from the dead, He has shown Himself to them and now He is going home to eternal glory… Their leader is leaving them and they are preparing for a life they have not known, we can put ourselves in this situation when something unfamiliar happens to us, we can draw a parallel to our lives when the usual is changed; however, we are called to remember that as a child of God we are called to wait upon the Lord… Isaiah tells us in his prophetical book that “…they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength…” You can’t do it on your own, stop trying to figure things out on you’re on, instead wait upon the Lord and the power that you will receive through the gift of the Holy Spirit… Peter denied Christ and left the courtyard weeping; however, when the Holy Spirit came upon him, he preached and 3,000 souls were saved… The point that we must learn is that we are nothing without the savior and that we are unstoppable with Him… The key is, understanding that He must be in the midst if we want to experience the success that only comes from above… There are many times in our lives when we feel weak, many days that we feel like we can’t go on and want to throw in the towel; however, Jesus reminded the disciples just like Luke reminds us today that we will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes… The message for us today is to wait on the Lord, this is not to be confused with not doing anything in life, but rather positioning ourselves in the will of God so that He can strengthen us and mold us according to His desires… As Jesus was preparing to depart from Earth and return to Heaven He instructed His disciples of things to come… He assured them of a comforter and guide in the form of the Holy Spirit which would be poured out upon them after He left! It is important to understand that the disciples were scared and captured by fear at the sight of Jesus leaving the earth; the disciples still didn’t really understand the magnitude of what Jesus came to the earth for and why He was leaving, they had walked with Him for three years turned away from normal practices and now they feel alone and isolated! I think it’s safe to say that we can only imagine the fear that had come upon them… In our lives we face that same kind of fear, Jesus may not be here with us physically, but when we choose to follow Him we separate ourselves from the way of the world and make a choice that will lead us down a path different from others…  The bible says, “Stand still and know that I am God…” It also says as we studied earlier that, “They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength!” The bottom line is that we must be patient, be attentive and be alert; your breakthrough, healing and deliverance are in His hand… Wait on Him, He is coming!!!

BE BLESSED!!!

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