Seeking the Power and Taking Authority
Pastor Jim May
We live in an age when everyone wants to be empowered. Every segment of our society, every little group of dissidents and every club or organization wants to have the power to control its own destiny. Men and women want the power to just be themselves without having to answer to anyone for their behavior, whether it’s good or bad.
Everyone wants to be empowered to live according to the dictates of his own mind, but this can never be. If every man was free to choose his own course of actions without regard to how it affected his fellowman, we would dissolve into a world of absolute chaos. Just take a look at our public school systems and you will see what I mean.
There was a time when principals ruled and teachers maintained control. Then the federal government passed laws that empowered the students and gave them rights above the teachers and principals. Now anarchy reigns in the schools and education has nearly been destroyed.
Empowerment is not always the answer. Sometimes the answer is submission to authority. God given authority is there for a purpose. God knows our hearts and he knows how quickly the heart of man can turn against his neighbor and against the leadership of God, so God created and set into place certain authority figures to maintain the proper controls that help to create and maintain order in society.
It all began at the Creation when God established the order of authority. Man was created first and given the position of leadership over the woman. That is God’s divine order whether we like it or not. Our families are in trouble today because we have attempted to do away with God’s order. Men won’t be men and step up to the plate performing the duties of husband, spiritual leader and priest of the home. Men have abdicated the position as head of the household and retreated into their own little world of jobs and times with the guys doing guy things. They have left the wife to take the position of leadership in the home.
It’s no wonder then that we have generations of kids growing up with only one parent, and with very little, if any, spiritual training. The priest of the house is off fishing or hunting instead of taking his family to church. Then we wonder why our kids won’t serve the Lord. How can they serve a God that they have never known? It’s high time that men become the leaders of their families; not the Lord of the House, but the leader and priest of the house. The home doesn’t need a taskmaster or a slave driver at the head, but a man who loves God and will love his family and lead them back into the ways of the Lord.
Of course there are families where the woman of the house takes that authority because she is a stronger figure than the man. She rules the roost and whatever she says is law. The meek husband is more than willing to sit back and let her have her way as long as she leaves him alone. What kind of lesson in life is that to his son? Does that son have much of a chance for a normal home as God intended for it to be? I doubt it.
God intended for man and wife to act as one; to be in agreement in how to teach the children, how to support the family and to present a unified front to their children so that the kids would recognize the unity and authority of the parents. Now we have kids who have no parents to teach them. They are left to their own devices and to fend for themselves because mom and dad just don’t care enough or have the time to teach. So the kids usurp the authority and begin to rule the house so get what they want.
Political groups across the country want their “rights”. They want to be empowered to spread their belief system everywhere they go. Its groups like the ACLU and Greenpeace that are empowered by Congress to preach their “gospel of freedom for the individual at the expense of freedom for all men” and “rights of one segment of society above the rights of others”. They are funded with tax dollars to preach a doctrine of “taking care of Mother Earth and worshipping the trees and the dust of the earth”, proclaiming that the creation is more important than the Creator and that the life of a human being, created in the image of God, is less important than that of a bird or a fish that may become extinct. Empowerment of the wrong people only brings disaster and confusion.
These problems didn’t come from God’s divine order. They arose because the evil heart of man decided to rebel against God and create his own New World Order. And we have only scratched the surface. This is only the beginning of the troubles of giving power to the wrong people.
Criminal rights laws have been passed that now empower the criminal and protect him from prosecution over some very minor technicality of the law, while innocent victims can be sued by the criminal that offended them and win his case because of twisted laws.
In today’s society you have your purse snatched at the mall and then the criminal that stole it can turn around and sue you if he accidentally shoots pepper spray from your purse into his eye. Such is the depths of injustice that we are downing in because of our deviation from divine order of authority.
All of us like the idea of being empowered to determine our own future. We like the power to make our own decisions. We hate it when someone controls us. We don’t like it when the boss can tell us when to clock in, when to clock out, when to take a break or when to eat lunch. We would all prefer a job that lets us choose our own work schedule. Jobs wouldn’t be so bad if you could get to work about 9’ish, take a coffee break at 10, eat lunch at 11, take another break at 12 and then clock out when you were ready to leave. But the boss is empowered by the fact that you want that paycheck. Therefore he has authority over your life.
Most people are seeking for a church that operates that way too. They are searching for a church that will schedule its services to meet at a convenient time, at any one of several convenient locations, with all the comforts of home, where you can go just as you are, kick off your shoes and be entertained for a little while and leave when you are ready, but still be there when you really need help.
Instead of seeking the empowerment from the Holy Ghost to serve the Lord, we are seeking for churches that empower its members to do as they please just so the attendance and especially the offerings, and stay on the rise.
But tonight I want you to know that we need to be seeking for a different kind of empowerment. We need to be seeking after the power of the Holy Spirit and pray that He baptizes us with the Holy Ghost and Fire. We need that anointing power of God that moves us, shakes us, cleanses us, delivers us and creates a new man out of us.
That’s the empowerment that Jesus taught, not this other garbage that we have talked about.
Luke 9:1-4, "Then he called his twelve disciples together, and gave them power and authority over all devils, and to cure diseases. And he sent them to preach the kingdom of God, and to heal the sick. And he said unto them, Take nothing for your journey, neither staves, nor scrip, neither bread, neither money; neither have two coats apiece. And whatsoever house ye enter into, there abide, and thence depart."
We need the power of God in our hearts and lives so that our prayers will be answered. I want authority, not over the minds and bodies of men, but over the power of the devil that comes to kill, steal and destroy my life and my family. I want that authority to resist the devil, to command him to come out, to cast him out of the hearts of men and women and to set the captive free. I want the authority that can only come from the power of the Holy Ghost through the Blood of Jesus Christ. That’s the only empowerment that the devil takes note of.
Jesus told the disciples, speaking also to you and I down through the ages when He said in Acts 1:8, "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 Judea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth."
I want to be empowered by the Holy Ghost and Fire. I want the power of God so strong in my life that Satan trembles when I wake up in the morning and breathes a sigh of relief when I fall to sleep at night.
Are you empowered today? Do you feel the power of God flowing in your spirit? You can have that power right now. All you have to do is be filled with the Holy Ghost with the evidence of speaking in other tongues and you will be endued with power from on High; power to speak, power to preach, power to pray, power to witness, power to serve, power to love, power to overcome and power to be victorious in every situation. Are you empowered by God? Seek after the Holy Ghost. Seek after God. Let God’s divine order of power and authority rule in your home and in your life and in your heart and see what a difference it will make.
