Committed To The Spirit

INTRO.- ILL.- AT&T fired President John Walter after nine months, saying he lacked "intellectual leadership". He received a $26 million severance package. Perhaps it’s not Walter who was lacking intelligence.

ILL.- A man walked in to a Topeka, Kansas Kwik Shop, and asked for all the money in the cash drawer. Apparently, the take was too small, so he tied up the store clerk and worked the counter himself for three hours until police showed up and grabbed him.

Some people do some mighty dumb things.

ILL.- February 10, 2006, Fort Lauderdale, Fla. Myrlene Severe was returning from a trip in Haiti, when an alert Customs officer noticed there was something in her suitcase that she forgot to declare. Her head. Not hers but “a” head.

The skull was supposed to ward off evil spirits, she allegedly told shocked Customs officials. Severe, 30, told them she got the ’’package’’ from a Haitian man and planned to use it to ward off evil spirits as part of her Voodoo beliefs. But instead of protecting her, the head landed her in jail.

Severe, a native of Haiti, was arrested and charged with intentionally smuggling a human head into the United States and not having the proper paperwork, as well as bringing hazardous material on an airplane. Each count carries a five-year maximum sentence, meaning Severe could spend up to 15 years in federal prison if convicted.

Brothers and sisters, Myrlene Severe is severely committed to ward off evil spirits. But I also think she is severely mixed up! Not wanting any evil spirits to attack her is one thing, but acquiring some Haitian skull is not the way to keep them away!

We are not surprised, however, at anything some people do.

Many people are quite superstitious about things in life, but instead of seeking after the one, true living God, they do all kinds of crazy things. They believe in all kinds of crazy things, anywhere from witchcraft to scientology.

We believe, however, in the one true living God, His son, the Lord Jesus Christ, and the Spirit, the Holy Spirit who lives in us.

Rom. 8:9 “You, however, are controlled not by the sinful nature but by the Spirit, if the Spirit of God lives in you. And if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Christ.”

Acts 2:38 “Peter replied, "Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. And you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.”

Acts 5:32 “We are witnesses of these things, and so is the Holy Spirit, whom God has given to those who obey him."

God gives us His Holy Spirit when we obey Him. If we take God at His Word then the Holy Spirit comes to live in a person when they obey Him in repentance and baptism.

PROP.- Since the Holy Spirit is the 3rd person of the Godhead we should be committed to Him as well as to the Father and the Son.

1- Committed to acquiring His help

2- Committed to allowing His transformation

I. COMMITTED TO ACQUIRING HIS HELP

ILL.- We all need help in life. Wall Street Journal, ‘Befuddled PC Users Flood Help Llines.’ AUSTIN, Texas - The exasperated help-line caller said she couldn’t get her new Dell computer to turn on. Jay Ablinger, a Dell Computer Corp. technician, made sure the computer was plugged in and then asked the woman what happened when she pushed the power button.

"I’ve pushed and pushed on this foot pedal and nothing happens," the woman replied. "Foot pedal?" the technician asked. "Yes," the woman said, "this little foot pedal with the on switch." The "foot pedal," it turned out, was the computer’s mouse, a hand-operated device that helps to control the computer’s operation. That lady was stomping on her computer mouse!

We all need help in life, whether it’s help with a computer, car, work, children or whatever.

ILL,- We tend to think that preachers have no problems. Listen to this note from a preacher friend. “We kept a kid last night (yes, another one) for some of our members who were going to be out of town and they called this afternoon asking if we could keep him again tonight.

“I guess I just don’t know how to say no, so we’ve got yet another teenager staying with us who isn’t ours. I felt like we just got dumped on. (It’s not the kid’s fault.) We have virtually no privacy as it is, and just when you think it can’t get any worse, it does. I’ve had to both drop him off at his school as well as pick him up yesterday and today and will have to take him tomorrow morning, and the school he attends is a good 20 miles from here.