Holy Spirit Power Part 1

It’s been another great week for me just studying the Word of God, and one of the things I love about the Bible is I, personally, tend to get distracted. I tend to get off course in life. You’re doing really well, and suddenly, you just start heading another direction. That’s one of the things I love about the Word of God is it shows you. It opens your eyes up. And you think, ‘Wow! I think I’ve been heading the wrong direction here.’ And that’s one of the things that God’s Word has done for me this week.

I finally got one of these things. GPS. I’ve been waiting. I keep waiting for the prices to go down, and it’s like half what it used to be. Keep going down, down, down, down, and I can’t wait. I’m just so cheap, and then someone just finally got me one. But it was one of those things I would have saved so much money had I gotten this earlier just in gas and time. It’s just like my wife. I guess I can talk about it. A few weeks ago, she was coming home from Hollywood so she jumped on the 5 South. We could have really used one of these, but she came home with a piñata. And I shouldn’t make it that far, but it’s close. But you know what? Now that I’m in your world, you GPSers, you know what I love about this? I love when you make a wrong turn, it doesn’t get mad at you. It just says recalculating. I love that. I love that. It’s like, ‘Why didn’t you listen to me?’ No, no, it doesn’t say it. It just says, ‘recalculating.’ And it’s so assuring, and I just want you to know because she’s so nice I just want to say, ‘Thank you, I’m sorry.’ But it’s that assuring voice that says- You know what? It gives you that confidence. It’s like it’s basically saying to me- I don’t know what it’s saying to you, but basically, she’s still saying to me, ‘I’ll still get you there. I’ll still get you there. It’ll take a little longer, but I’ll get you there.’

Some of you have taken some wrong turns in life. We all do it. And I hope that this morning is one of those times when you just hear the Holy Spirit saying, ‘Recalculating. I’ll still get you there. It’s going to take a little longer now, but I’ll still get you there.’ That’s what the Word of God does for us. It gives us a new set of directions. At some point, we have to listen though. And so this morning, for some of you that have gone some wrong directions, and the thing I’m learning more and more about God is His grace and just saying, ‘Yeah, you went the wrong way, but I’m not here to just yell at you and tell you that you screwed up. I’m just saying I’m recalculating your life now for you and giving you a new set of directions and seeing we can still get there. We can still get there. Doesn’t matter what you’ve done. We can still get there. But now listen to me this time.’ And so would you stand as we read the Word of God.

Let me read from Second Peter Chapter 1 as we continue in our study of 2 Peter and verse 5. It says, “For this very reason, make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue, and virtue with knowledge, and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with steadfastness, and steadfastness with godliness, and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love. For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they will keep you from being ineffective or unfruitful in knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. For whoever lacks these qualities is so nearsighted that he is blind, having forgotten that he is cleansed from his former sins. Therefore, brothers, be all the more diligent to make your calling and election sure, for if you practice these qualities, you will never fall. For in this way, there will be richly provided for you an entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.” [2 Peter 1:5-11 ESV]

Father, help us to really listen to Your Word today. For those of us who have strayed, maybe have gotten off course a little bit, I just pray that we would really believe in the power of Your Holy Spirit to change us, to get us back on course. And help us this time, Father, to listen to Your Word that we can become those people that You want us to be and that we want to be. In Jesus’ name, Amen.