Episode 144 - Hot Topics Series - The Promise of Power

The Burt (Not Ernie) Show

Hey there and hello to ya today. So glad you are listening to the podcast and hey, I am kicking off a new series on the show called “Hot Topics”. Not exactly the kind of things we might consider hot topics, per se, but some promises we find in the Bible that seem a little bit hard to believe in our very own personal lives. But these are promises God has given us in His Word, hard to believe or not. And I am excited to dig in and stretch our faith as we choose to believe that these promises are true for God’s people.

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Hot topics.

I have to admit, I am feeling a bit hesitant about this… I mean, it feels awfully big to address the proverbial elephant in the room, right? And in the room of Jesus followers, well, I guess it feels sort of extra big.

The first hot topic promise we will look at is the promise of power.

Now, the reason this is a hot topic is simply because so many of us do not live with much, if any, power from the Lord in our lives. If we’re honest, we can admit that, right? But can we fairly lay the blame for our semi-powerless Christian lives at the Lord’s feet? Or should we say, with a lot of transparency and honesty, that the devil is really good at duping us into thinking either A) we are living in the power Jesus promised us or B) we don’t know what that ought to look like in our daily life, so we don’t pray and ask for it or C) it never really comes to mind at all.

Let me read you a verse from the book of Acts, chapter one, verse 8. The Amplified says, “But you will receive power and ability when the Holy Spirit comes upon you; and you will be My witnesses (to tell people about Me) both in Jerusalem and in all Judea, and Samaria, and even to the ends of the earth.”

These are words in red, the very words of Jesus, spoken after His death, burial and resurrection, before He ascended to heaven. He said this, and I expect that He meant exactly what He said.

He didn’t misspeak.

That’s just not a possibility with the Lord.

So we know what Jesus said, and we know He meant it, so what comes next? For us to live in a state of belief that this is a promise for us and He will keep this promise to us, in us, through us.

Now, you do need to know Jesus as Lord and Savior for this promise to be your promise. And I think when you yield your life to Him, when you repent and receive His forgiveness and the gift of eternal life with Him, and then obey Him, you are sealed with the Holy Spirit. That’s pretty Biblical. In the book of Acts, after Jesus ascended to the Father, the disciples and other believers, men and women, gathered in the upper room and when they were there, praying, and waiting for the Holy Spirit (which is what Jesus told them to do) then the Spirit came in like a rushing wind and they had flames of fire, tongues of fire on their heads, and they all received the Holy Spirit. In other places in Acts, we see the apostles praying that new believers would receive the Holy Spirit. I think you can for sure go to your pastor and have him pray for you to receive the Holy Spirit, and I don’t see in my Bible how that would be wrong. It’s the way the first century church did things, ya know?

Because the promise is that we will receive power and ability when the Holy Spirit comes upon us. Now you may be thinking this was only for that select group of people at that time, and I want to share a verse from John, chapter 14, verse 16. And I’ll stick with the Amplified to read this for the sake of continuity. It says, and these are the very words of Jesus and in this portion of Scripture He had a lot to say, John 14, 15, 16, to His disciples but also to all who would believe on His name later on (that’s you and me, right). So John 14:16 says: “And I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Helper (Comforter, Advocate, Intercessor - Counselor, Strengthener, Standby) to be with you forever.”

It’s always a good thing to prove the Bible by the Bible, if you would. When you find verses that explain other portions of the Word of God, that’s proving the Bible by the Bible. And that is what John 14:16 does with Acts 1:8. Jesus has asked the Father to give you the Helper, the Holy Spirit. And I don’t think you are the exception, the only child of God who gets left out. That’s really not how our God works, thankfully!

This really is your promise. And we really do want to kind of maximize this one in our lives. I mean, think about who will benefit once the people of God are all living in a state of Holy Spirit power. Your family. Your local church, and the global church. Your neighbors, your coworkers, your extended family, your community, your city and state, the nation, the world. This impacts so many people. Your circumstances, well, how can they get the best of you when you are living in those circumstances filled with the power of the Holy Spirit? The same power that raised Jesus from the grave dwells in you. (That’s straight from Paul’s letter to the church at Ephesus, Ephesians 1:19-20). The same power that raised Jesus from the grave now dwells in you. There’s a hot topic promise from the Bible, to be sure!

I mean, how do you like them apples?

That’s the power Jesus was talking about in Acts 1:8. Dead man raised up out of the grave power. There is no other comparable power in the world, in the universe.

It’s His intention, and that should make it our expectation.

I should live expecting that what the Lord has promised is going to be my reality.

Now it’s a hot topic, for sure.

But maybe that’s mostly due to the fact that we just don’t live in His power, for the most part.

Honestly, we are sort of lulled to sleep in a spiritual sense by the norms and stresses and distractions of our lives and of the times in which we live.

It’s almost automatic to be lulled, am I right? Don’t have to work at it, just sort of drift into a lull. Keep scrolling. Keep flipping through channels. Keep working on the next project, working toward the next goal in life… all these things can lull us to sleep spiritually. And when that happens, we give little thought to the power of the Holy Spirit in us.

And that seems like a win for the enemy, that dirty dog the devil.

I don’t know about you, but I am so sick and tired of the devil getting W’s. I would love it if he had no further marks in the Win column. When we live in the power and ability, as the Amplified says, of the Holy Spirit, all we do is win and all those tallies for the devil end up in the L column, all losses for the evil one.

For that to be true, you and I have got to get back in the game. Not bystanders, not spectators, but victors through Christ Jesus. More than conquerors in Christ. We’ve got big promises! Let’s start living them out. You know, in the Old Testament when the Israelites finally were ready to cross the Jordan River after forty long years of wandering in the desert, those men who were assigned to carry God’s Ark of the Covenant had to put their feet into the Jordan River, albeit at flood stage, so like think of a river overflowing its banks, and when they did that, out of obedience to the Lord, then the water stopped flowing and the Bible says it heaped up in a pile all the way back to a town called Adam. They had to get their feet wet, and then the promised miracle happened. Sometimes we haven’t gotten our feet wet. We’re angry at God for not moving us forward, for not keeping His promises, but our car is in the garage, in park, keys out of the ignition, doors locked, garage door down, and we’re inside the house. Is that a driveable car? You already know this saying, “God doesn’t drive parked cars.” Well, it can sure be true, can’t it? You may have to get your feet wet, get back in the game, He may be calling you to step out in faith. If He is, then just obey Him. And see what He will do next.

He wants to keep every single promise, you cannot convince me otherwise. And He also is bringing us to a place of maturity, making us more like His Son, Jesus. That’s sanctification. You don’t want your children to be thirty-five and acting like they are two. Neither does God, our good Father. Step out in faith if that is what He is asking you to do. And know that the promise He has made here in Acts chapter one, verse eight, is going to prove true. Believe it.

Expect to have power and ability in your life. Be a witness for the Lord, be part of the reach Jesus talked about here, even to the ends of the earth. Be part of that! The power isn’t about us, really. It’s about honoring our God, bringing Him glory, and reaching people for Him because He loves them. John 3:16, for God so loved. So loved! You know the verse as well as I do. Let’s love well and we do that when we love others, not when we love ourselves. (Can I say that again, because it kind of matters quite a lot…)

Acts 17 verse 6 in the ESV says: And when they could not find them, they dragged Jason and some of the brothers before the city authorities, shouting, “These men who have turned the world upside down have come here also..”

Okay, so obviously I shared a verse sort of like jumping in right in the middle of a movie, at a super critical and exciting part. So these believers had been making some waves (and anybody who ever makes a real difference in this world, maybe especially a good kind of difference, makes waves - that’s just the reality, the wave makers are the change agents, that’s just the way it is). They had made an impact, influenced some people, disrupted the status quo (the status quo has changed, son… that’s my movie quote for this episode…bonus points if you know what movie that is from…) These men have turned the world upside down.

There are far worse things that could be said about us.

I’d be honored to turn my little corner of the world upside down for Jesus’ name and for the Kingdom of our God.

But we cannot do that in our own might (which is basically nill). We need the power that comes from the Holy Spirit, and then we can do great exploits for our King.

This promise is for you today. And I hope that you can walk in the fullness of the power the Holy Spirit wants to pour out into your life and see people’s lives changed and God glorified. My prayer for you today is that you will receive power and ability from the Spirit of the Living God who indwells you, and that you will put the key of your life into the ignition, turn it over and ask, “Where we going today, Lord? Cuz I’m all in.”

Lord bless you today, and if this episode has encouraged you, I’d love for you to share it.

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