Breathe: Unleashing the Power
Acts 1:4-8 2 Tim. 1:7
Herbert Jackson tells the story of when he was a new missionary who was assigned a car that would not start without a push. After pondering his problem, he devised a plan. He went to the school near his home, got permission to take some children out of class, and had them push his car off. As he made his rounds, he would either park on a hill or leave the engine running. He did this for two years. Ill health forced the Jackson family to leave, and a new missionary came to that station. When Jackson proudly began to explain his arrangement for getting the car started, the new man began looking under the hood. Before the explanation was complete, the new missionary interrupted, "Why, Dr. Jackson, I believe the only trouble is this loose cable." He gave the cable a twist, stepped into the car, started the car to Jackson’s astonishment. For two years needless trouble had become routine. The power was there all the time. Only a loose connection kept Jackson from putting that power to work. J.B. Phillips paraphrases Ephesians l:19-20, "How tremendous is the power available to us who believe in God." When we make firm our connection with God, his life and power flow through us.
As we look at the Book of Acts, what we find is that when we are connected to God through the Holy Spirit, great power comes. We are not created to live powerless existences. In Acts 1 Jesus makes a promise to the disciples about the gift of the Holy Spirit. “Do not leave Jerusalem, but wait for the gift my Father promised, which you have heard me speak about. For John baptized with water, but in a few days you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit….. But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” It is on the Day of Pentecost that we see this gift fulfilled through the sound of a violent wind and tongues of fire which landed on each of the disciples. These disciples, who had all denied and deserted Jesus at the cross and were now hiding behind locked doors in fear of their lives that they were the next to be crucified, all of a sudden were filled with power. They couldn’t contain themselves and so went down into the streets of Jerusalem and started to preach the Good News of Jesus, each in different languages to the pilgrims who had come to the Holy City for the Festival of Weeks and that day “about 3000 were added to their number….” That event shows us that one of the marks of the Holy Spirit is living with power. And here’s the exciting part: that same power which was unleashed on the disciples at Pentecost is available to you and me.
Second, God created us with a purpose and a God potential. God has this incredible plan for our lives but the problem is we think we can’t get there. We tell ourselves we can’t do that because we’ve sinned and aren’t worthy to embrace all that God has in store for us. Jeremiah 29:11 says, “For I know the plans I have for you…plans to prosper you and not to harm you and plans to give you a hope and a future.” It doesn’t matter who you are or what you have done or how you have fallen short of God’s will for your life, that is a word for you. Three times Jeremiah uses the word plans. God not only has a plan for you, God has plans for you. God has great plans for your life and wants you to experience them all. No matter how bad we mess up, no matter how far we run from God, no matter how rebellious we are, God still has incredible plans for your life and the power to make them happen in your life. God has a limitless supply of opportunity laid out before you. There is power in knowing that.
Third, my weakness is an opportunity for God’s strength. Too often we fall victim to the big lie that weakness is the opposite of power, that my weakness is a limitation on God’s power and that God is only as powerful as my weakness. When we buy into that lie, then we end up pointing a lot of fingers at other people, placing a lot of blame and always playing the victim. But instead of doing that, Paul learns that his weakness is an opportunity for God. Look at 2 Cor 12:9. In this passage, Paul has been pleading with God to take away this weakness and struggle in his life. It doesn’t say what it is but what we do know is that Paul felt that it hindered him in his work for Jesus Christ and thus wanted it gone. He prayed continuously for God to relieve him of this weakness and struggle in his life. God said to Paul in return: “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” (And Paul responds) “Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.”
This is why the Bible can say that” all things work together for good.” Romans 8:28 God can take all of you, even all of your baggage and use it for His plan for your life. God loves to take your failures and turn it into His victory. Even though you may blow it, God still has a plan for you. No matter who you are, God has a place for you in God’s plan of salvation for the world. You get to be the one to have an impact on other people’s lives in the name of Jesus. You get to be the one to have a role in building a congregation which reflects heaven with people from every tribe and tongue. God isn’t limited by my sins but rather has the power to not only restore my life but to use those for the sake of His mission for the world. God has the power to enable you to do things and go places where you couldn’t go if you had a million years to try to do it on your own. When God sent the Holy Spirit to each one of you, He unleashed this limitless supply of power and potential, you couldn’t exhaust if you spent the rest of your life trying.
Fourth, real power isn’t what I can do but what God can do through me, that I could never do on my own. What God does through me in spite of my weakness shows God’s power and it’s where I experience His power in my life. It’s when something happens in your life or you accomplish it and look back and say, “That’s gotta be God!” That’s when you know it’s Holy Spirit empowered. It’s not what you can accomplish but rather what God can accomplish through you. It’s what God does in spite of your weakness through you. And I think that raises a question. “In your spiritual journey, are you seeking to accomplish anything for God and if so, what is it?” And if you are, “Are you seeking to accomplish something that you can do on your own or is it such a great and monumental task that it can only be done if God’s hand is right in the middle of it?”
Think for just a moment of the people that God has used in powerful ways throughout history. Moses was a murderer on the lamb with a speech impediment and God took those weaknesses and used them to free the Israelites in Egypt and deliver to the Promise Land and God’s plan for them to be His Chosen People and a light unto the nations. That’s power! Esther was a Jewish handmaiden, a nobody, who married the king of Persia, the most powerful man on earth, and was God’s chosen vessel to save the Jewish people. The Apostle Paul was the chief persecutor of Christians and God turns him into the greatest evangelist, theologian and church planter history has ever known. That’s power! Mother Theresa was a small person with a little voice who never really felt that close connection to God and at times doubted if there was even a God. But it was through that weakness that she served the poorest of the poor in India and has had a worldwide impact. That’s power! Pastor Mike Slaughter was flunking out of high school, smoking pot, a rebel who joined a band and often skirted the law but God called him and he became a pastor and built one of the largest and most influential churches in the country. That’s power! Evangelist Billy Graham had a bad speech defect as a child but this did not stop God from calling and equipping him. We all know what happened after that! That’s power! Think about yourself for a moment. How can God use your weaknesses, your flaws and redeem your sins to demonstrate his strength? Real power is what God can do through you!
In the first Spiderman movie, Peter Parker’s uncle gives him some sage advice and that’s our fifth point: “With great power comes great responsibility.” If all of this Holy Spirit power is available to us, then we have a responsibility to do something for Jesus and the kingdom with it. What is it that we are supposed to do with that power? Acts 1:8 answers it this way, “…you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” Holy Spirit power is about changing individual lives through our witness and ministry which will then lead to changing the world. This power was given to us not for our healing or our benefit but so that we can change people and thus change the world. It what the United Methodist Church’s mission is “to make disciples for Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world.” It’s about changing the world. And our reaction is, “I am just one person. What can I do?”
Sixth, we are to change the world one life at a time. How do you do that? Just ask people how you can serve their needs. It’s that simple. It’s showing the love of Christ by engaging people at their point of need. So here’s the question: whose life are you changing? Who are you investing in? You don’t have to change the world right off the bat, just start with one life at a time. Here’s the thing: you start with one person and the Holy Spirit power can become viral. It can spread everywhere. It starts one life at a time but then that person changes another who change s another who changes another. That’s what happened with Jesus. He started to share the Good News with the 12 and by the time Pentecost came, the 12 were joined by 90 which then became 500. When the disciples stepped out of the Upper Room to preach the Gospel, they added almost 3000 the first day! And who knows how many people were changed by that 3000 after they received the Holy Spirit. What happened is that God took all of those people who had traveled from different parts of the world and then sent them back home changed people filled with the power of the Holy Spirit. You see how Holy Spirit power becomes viral as we share that power, one life at a time.
Rudy Rasmus learned the family business from his father when he was just five years old. His dad brought home a set of blueprints and unveiled his business plans. He said, “This a motel and other people’s husbands are going to come and give us money to spend time in one of our rooms.” Seventeen years later, Motel Houston opened its doors right next door to the family’s home. The motel strictly catered to prostitutes and their customers. With Rudy in charge, the business took off. Rudy calls it a borderline bordello, because he says he never took a cut of the prostitutes’ profits.” But it was about making money. Yet there was definitely something missing in his life. Then one day when he was at a funeral, a woman caught his eye. She was a Christian and they began dating but Juanita never really understood what Rudy’s business was. She was admittedly naïve by the grace of God she says because she was able to see what was in Rudy’s heart. They fell in love and married. Juanita wanted to have a godly family and took Rudy to church. “The preacher reached out to Rudy and mentored him,. Rudy joined a Bible study. Juanita prayed for her husband. He eventually became a Christian though still ran the family business. Eventually his changed heart helped him to change his career. Rudy and Juanita volunteered to pastor an inner city church in Houston, Texas, that had just nine members. They founded the Bread of Life program to help the most disadvantaged communities in the city. Twenty years later, St. Johns UMC and The Bread of Life have changed the landscape of Downtown Houston by providing 9 tons of fresh food weekly to hungry families, 12,000 hot meals monthly and nightly housing to hundreds of chronically homeless men and women. They built an apartment complex which provided 43 formerly homeless residents a permanent-supportive home to take significant steps in improving their lives. Rudy has since coordinated his domestic and now global anti-hunger initiatives in conjunction with Beyoncé’s worldwide concert tours with food drives held during her concerts. Thousands of pounds of food were donated to food banks in each tour city. Last year, General Mills Foods and Feeding America (the nation’s leading hunger-relief charity), further partnered with St. Johns and Beyoncé to help battle hunger in America. The goal was to deliver more than 3.5 million meals to local food banks in her tour cities. And Pastor Rudy says, “I am committed to touching and changing the world…one life at time.” He should know because it started with his one life being changed.
