Friday, July 29, 2016

Get Up and Walk


Taking him by the right hand, he helped him up,
and instantly the man's feet and ankles became strong.
~ Acts 3:7

As Peter and John were going to the Temple (“church”) to pray, they saw a beggar, a man who’d been cripple from birth sat at the Temple’s gate.  Peter, like most of us, didn’t have earthly riches, so he said to the hopeless man, “I have no silver and gold, but what I do have I give to you.  In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, rise up and walk” (3:6).  Peter gave what he had … access to Jesus.  By the good news Peter had been born again, baptized in the Holy Spirit, … and given God’s power to share and witness in a fantastic manner the complete healing found in Jesus.  He was no different than you or me.   

Jesus gives all believers – Peter … you – the power to be witnesses (Acts 1:8) no matter where we are or go.  That power is the Spirit of God filling you in order that you can witness and proclaim the Word of God!  It is the power to enable your hands to be a tool for God’s miracles with the laying on of hands, your being accompanied with signs and wonders of God, and the ability to proclaim with your mouth that the sick be healed in Jesus name.  … O’ Hallelujah! … Wow, dare I say, even to raise the dead (Matt. 10:7) with the resurrection power of Christ Jesus! That’s all we have at our disposal for being a witness. …  
Except  … your willingness and compassion to witness, and to:  take people by the hand, help them up, that they may instantly receive the gospel, receive spiritual healing, receive the power of the resurrection … and receive healing of body, and see the wonders manifest by God as you stop to help them up.  If God is in you, then you are like Peter and release the power of Lord’s Spirit by speaking, “So be it in the Name of Jesus.”  And then, simply, take the crippled, the spiritually dead, by the hand and help them up.  So be it, “In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth.”

Let's Walk Together,
Owen <><

Wednesday, July 13, 2016

Humility is not Weakness

Andrew Murray identifies a reality, that, “Humility, the place of entire dependence on God, is, from the very nature of things, the first duty and the highest virtue of the Christian.” So, humility—is birthed in a life focused on surrender that leaves one helplessly open to God. It is a sincere Christ centered perspective—it is when one truly has an emptying of self, acknowledging that one’s life, provision, and eternal state rests completely in the Lord's hands. 

We cannot confuse humility as weakness or the need to back down to criticism in our worship and witness of Christ.  Read the Gospels and Acts, Jesus and the disciples did not stop their witness, in humility they relied on God’s Helper to help them “run the race.”  Remember, we are in Christ’s likeness; God has made us into something great by his Spirit in us at salvation and upon us in power by Christ’s immersion of us into the Helper – His Spirit.  As Paul, said, “I am not in the least inferior to the ‘super-apostles,’ even though I am nothing” (2 Cor. 12:11).  Murray adds, “It is the surrender of faith to Jesus in His self-humiliation and death that opens the way to the full blessing of Pentecost.”  The church was birthed by wind and fire - you and I are the Church. 

We cannot attain the blessing of the Helper, without humility, and dare I say salvation, for we must be humble enough to confess our sin and trust Christ, indeed humble ourselves before the Lord (see Philippians 2:5-11).  To say I am saved and that I have the blessing of God with His Spirit in power is not a lack of humility, but a humble truth—truth that comes in power when we live in complete humility, emptying of self, in turn, being filled and overflowing with God's Spirit and power to reveal Christ. 

“Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power.”
Ephesians 6:10, 

Owen <><