Signs and Wonders -1
How many would say you are believer?
Mark 16:16-18 (English Standard Version)
16Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned. 17And these signs will accompany those who believe: in my name…
What are signs and wonders?
They are demonstrations of the spirit of God that can’t be explained (designed to bring glory to God.) – VITAL!!!!
It Validates God’s power and ability
Some of you have more faith in the force and in the Lord of Rings than you do in what God can do in and through us.
Some signs and wonders
• Healing the Sick
• Performing Miracles
• Acts 8:39-40 Philip was Translated.
• Water into Wine John 4
• Manifestation of God’s glory – Numbers 20:6
• Rushing wind and fire
• Shaking of buildings Act 4:31 Acts 16:26
• Falling Down – John 18:6
• SALVATION
Why are signs and wonders important?
1. People will know that God is real.
John 4:46-50 (English Standard Version)
46So he came again to Cana in Galilee, where he had made the water into wine. And at Capernaum there was an official whose son was ill. 47When this man heard that Jesus had come from Judea to Galilee, he went to him and asked him to come down and heal his son, for he was at the point of death. 48So Jesus said to him, "Unless you see signs and wonders you will not believe." 49The official said to him, "Sir, come down before my child dies." 50Jesus said to him, "Go; your son will live." The man believed the word that Jesus spoke to him and went on his way.
2. People’s faith won’t be in man.
1 Corinthians 2:4-5 (English Standard Version)
4and my speech and my message were not in plausible words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, 5that your faith might not rest in the wisdom of men but in the power of God.
Reasons we don’t see signs and wonders today.
1. We don’t believe even though we know it to be true.
Mark 16:16-18 (English Standard Version)
16Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned. 17And these signs will accompany those who believe: in my name…
Believe in the greek is pisteuō
to have faith in God – to commit (to trust)
Ps 14:1
1The fool says in his heart, "There is no God."
It takes the same faith to be perform signs and wonders as it does to be saved.
James 2:18-19 ESV
18But someone will say, "You have faith and I have works." Show me your faith apart from your works, and I will show you my faith by my works. 19You believe that God is one; you do well. Even the demons believe--and shudder!
James is saying that a faith that merely affirms correct belief without producing a changed life is lifeless.
Our nation is filled with lifeless churches, because it is filled with lifeless Christians.
It is because many don’t believe God do signs and wonders through us.
The bible tells us that “signs and wonders shall follow them that believe in His name.”
Now either we believe it or we don’t. To believe it is to act on it, to disbelieve it is to not act on it.
2. We don’t care because we are focused on the natural and not the spiritual.
1 Corinthians 2:14 (English Standard Version)
14The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned.
Some may thing that the word natural refers to the unsaved. No it is referring to those Christians that their senses are focused upon the things of this world.
“Intellectual Intelligence w/out Spiritual Intelligence = Emptyness.
• Goal Setting
• Promotions
• Better our present life
• Achieving our Purpose/Plan -
What about God’s purpose and Plan
Continue on….
1 Corinthians 3:1-2 (English Standard Version)
1But I, brothers,[a] could not address you as spiritual people, but as people of the flesh, as infants in Christ. 2I fed you with milk, not solid food, for you were not ready for it. And even now you are not yet ready,
Paul is telling us that as immature Christians, when we base our decisions and direction in life upon what we see in the natural we cannot have the faith for the supernatural.
Romans 1 – Turn there
1 Corinthians 3:12-15 (English Standard Version)
12Now if anyone builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw-- 13each one’s work will become manifest, for the Day will disclose it, because it will be revealed by fire, and the fire will test what sort of work each one has done. 14If the work that anyone has built on the foundation survives, he will receive a reward. 15If anyone’s work is burned up, he will suffer loss, though he himself will be saved, but only as through fire. (you’ll survive—but just barely.) MSG
That is why we must preach the about the Cross, the blood and the power of His Holy Spirit – other wise we have a church that is powerless.
1 Corinthians 1:17-18 (English Standard Version)
17For Christ did not send me to baptize but to preach the gospel, and not with words of eloquent wisdom, lest the cross of Christ be emptied of its power.
18For the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.
30(God) is the source of your life in Christ Jesus,
