[The Easter Life is] A Life Empowered (New Beginnings UMC)

You've probably guessed we're going to start with a video clip

comes from a movie, one of my favorite movies called Chariots

of Fire. If you haven't seen it, I really

encourage you to watch it. It's free on YouTube.

You can watch the whole movie on YouTube.

Even if you don't have a YouTube subscription, you can watch it

on YouTube. And it's a true story of Eric

Little, who was a missionary to China and an athlete.

He played rugby and he was a track star.

And we're going to watch 2 clips from that.

Both are pretty short and they're both races.

And the first one that just is a setup is it's a quarter mile

race. And at this point in his life,

Eric is not only training for the mission field, he's also

training for the Olympics. He wants to compete in the 1924

Summer Olympics for the United Kingdom.

And, and this is a a race that is building up to that.

What you see is a dramatization, of course, but it really

happened. So let's take a look at Eric

Little running his race here. At this point I showed a clip

from the movie Chariots of Fire. The scene is of 1/4 mile race in

which Eric Little is not down early in the race but comes back

to win. I didn't include the audio here

because the clip is mostly visual and the audio alone

wouldn't have added anything. Now back to the sermon.

Finish this clip with the same question that John finished the

scripture reading with, which is what does this mean?

On the day of Pentecost when the Holy Spirit came and, and all of

the folks, the Jewish folks from all over different parts of the

world were there in Jerusalem to celebrate Pentecost.

Pentecost was a Jewish celebration before it was a

Christian celebration and they heard the gospel being shared,

each one in their own native language and they asked what

does this mean? We see Eric Little running a

very courageous quarter mile race in which he's knocked down

toward the beginning and comes all the way back to win.

And, and it's worth asking, when we're talking about the Holy

Spirit, what, what does this mean?

What does this have to do with it?

I'm going to bring it all together as we go here today.

But what I want to talk about very first is the fact that you

get this is our last Sunday on the Living the Easter Life

series and, and the Easter life is, is a life, not only a life

turned upside down, it's a life of service.

It's a life of love. It's a life empowered by the

Holy Spirit, a life empowered. But in this day and age, we have

to be clear when we talk about being empowered, about having

power, because there are a lot of different ways to look at

this concept of power. There's a lot of ways of talking

about being empowered. And the way that that's used in

the book of Acts, the way that it's used in the New Testament

is very specific and the best, the best way to explain it, I

believe. Apologize in advance, because

once again, Star Wars. All right, this time Star Wars.

By contrast, I love Star Wars. Star Wars movies are wonderful.

Some of my favorite movies of all time.

All right, But the Holy Spirit is not the Force.

The Force in Star Wars is this. Well, in the first few movies it

was a mystical, mysterious thing, and then it became

midichlorians. We're going to stick with the

mystical, mysterious, but either way, this force is a force

that's out there in the universe that some people, Jedi and or

Sith can access and they can control and use the force to

accomplish things they want to accomplish.

Whether that's good or whether that's bad, they can do, you

know, they move things with their mind.

They can run fast, they can jump far.

They can extend their lives. They can they can do all sorts

of things that they want to do. They use the force to do that

and to do things that no one else can do.

And that's one kind of power that is not the Holy Spirit.

That is not empowerment of the. Now again, I'm not trashing Star

Wars. This is just, you know,

definition. By contrast, 'cause we need to

see what it is. It means when Jesus said the

Holy Spirit will come on you and you will receive power.

The Holy Spirit will fall on you and you will receive power.

What's he talking about? He's not talking about the force

with the force. Jedi's control the force and

they use it to do what they want to do.

When Jesus said the Holy Spirit will fall on you and you will

receive power, he meant that the Holy Spirit will empower us to

do what God wants us to do, which is very different, very

different. It's not as if God is giving us

a, a, a power up, a big power boost and that that increases

our health points and our experience points and, and our,

and our, and our fighting and our defense points so that we

can go out and accomplish our goals in life and do great and

wonderful and marvelous things with the power and the help of

the Holy Spirit. That would make the Holy Spirit

our personal assistant. And the Holy Spirit is, is

definitely not our personal assistant.

The Holy Spirit empowers us to do what God wants.

Let's take a look at what Jesus himself said.

So the first passage here is from Luke.

It's on Resurrection Sunday, the day Jesus rose from the dead.

He travels to Emmaus, talks with some folks on the way there.

Then he comes back to Jerusalem and meets with his followers

that they're still in the upper room.

This is men and women gathered together in the upper room.

Resurrection Sunday still here. They've just heard the rumors

that Jesus might be alive. Some of the women have seen him.

Some of the disciples have seen him.

And now Jesus shows up and talks to him all face to face.

And one of the things he says to them is this.

Jesus says repentance for forgiveness of sins will be

proclaimed in his name. That is his own name, Jesus name

to all the nations beginning in Jerusalem.

The good news, the good news is forgiveness of sins is available

to all through repentance. That good news is going to be

shared starting here in Jerusalem where we all are at

this moment, and then to the ends of the earth several weeks

later. On the day that Jesus ascends

into the heaven, he's once again meeting with his disciples, this

time out in the countryside, up on a hill.

And again it's men, it's women. It's not just the original 12

who are now 11 because Judas is dead now.

It's a larger group, about 120 folks or so, male and female,

young and old, educated, uneducated.

And Jesus says to them at that point, right before He ascends

into heaven, you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has

come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and to

the ends of the earth. Now he adds 2 locations between

that Judea and Samaria. But I want you to see the

parallel between what He said on Resurrection Sunday and what He

said on Ascension Day. You will be my witnesses.

You will proclaim good news starting right where you are and

to the ends of the earth. Now we need to remember who

Jesus was talking to. These were not highly educated

people. These were regular folks,

working class folks. The men would have had a limited

education. The women would almost certainly

have had even less education because of the way their society

was structured at that time. So they knew Hebrew.

They knew Aramaic, which is very similar to Hebrew, and they,

probably most of them, or at least some of them knew how to

speak or understand Greek. But ends of the Earth, there's

lots of languages to the ends of the earth.

Lots of languages, all of they knew because Israel is a very

the real one of the reasons why the nation of Israel gets

conquered by 1 empire after another for the past thousands

and thousands of years is it's, it is strategically located.

It is the crossroads and, and, and an intersection for great

civilizations, particularly great civilizations of that day

and that age. Now we're obviously discounting

the great civilizations that existed in what we now call the

Americas because they're on the other side of the world and

unknown to the folks in Israel at the time of the writing of

the Gospels. But, but they would have known

and experienced and encountered people from India traveling

through their land down to Africa, might have even known

some folks and encountered some folks from China.

They certainly would have encountered folks from Rome and

other parts of Europe and folks from the great civilizations of

of Africa at that time, Egypt and Ethiopia traveling N up into

other parts of the world. They would have known the

different that there were these all these different languages,

all of these different types of people with all these different

customs and all of these different cultures.

And they're supposed to be witnesses to everyone, to the

ends of the earth. We're just folks.

On top of that, traveling was expensive and extraordinarily

time consuming. What we can do, we can fly to

Europe in a day now, as opposed to spending months on a ship and

it would have taken weeks or months to get to the ends of the

earth, just the ends of the earth that they knew about, not

to mention the ends of the earth that they didn't know about.

Where were they going to get the money for that?

Where were they going to get the time for that?

How could they possibly be a witness to folks whose language

they didn't speak and who didn't speak their language?

How could this be possible? How can we do this?

Jesus has set us an impossible task.

But then Pentecost came. Let's see what happened on

Pentecost. It's the same exact parallel in

microcosm. It's in microcosm.

And then all of them were filled with and all of them is again,

it's men, it's women, it's young, it's old, it's educated,

it's uneducated. Gathered together in the upper

room where I believe we're told about 120 folks were there.

It was a big room where it was tight.

I one of those two, I hope they had their deodorant.

All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak

in other tongues, other languages as the Spirit enabled

them. Now they were staying in

Jerusalem, God fearing Jews from every nation under heaven.

When they heard this sound, a crowd came together in

bewilderment because each one heard their own language being

spoken. The Holy Spirit came and these

regular folks started telling the good news of the story of

Jesus Christ, and people from all over the world heard the

good news in their own language and Jesus disciples could go.

The Holy Spirit came with power so that we could do the work

that God has given us to do in microcosm right here.

We've got a sampling of the world right here in Jerusalem

with us. Now.

How much harder can it be for us to get to the ends of the earth?

But however hard it is, we already know that the Holy

Spirit will give us the power to do it.

The Holy Spirit came to empower them to do the work that God had

for them to do, to do the service that God had for them to

do. The Holy Spirit empowers us to

do what God wants, not what we want.

The Holy Spirit did not come so that we could live our best

lives now. The Holy Spirit did not come so

that we could fulfill our personal dreams and ambitions.

The Holy Spirit did not descend upon us so that we could.

We could be great or wonderful or mighty or awesome or popular

or any of those things. The Holy Spirit descended upon

the Church so that we could do what God wants us to do and will

empower us to do that always and everywhere.

The Holy Spirit, however, does not empower everyone to do

exactly the same thing. The Holy Spirit is empowered in

play. The piano.

Absolutely. Yeah.

Not me, not me, not me. I tried my my piano teacher

moved out of state after teaching me for six months.

I too choose to believe those two things are not related.

But you never know. The Holy Spirit does not empower

us all to do exactly the same thing.

And This is why I want to talk about this ordinary,

extraordinary example of Eric Little.

Extraordinary, because what Eric Little did was extraordinary.

And by his own words, his own explicit acknowledgement, he was

empowered to do that by the Spirit of God.

Ordinary, because this is what God offers all of us.

Ordinary, extraordinary. I, I, I get struck with that

ever. You know that you're a unique

individual, right? You've ever heard that you're a

unique, you're a unique individual.

You're, you're a unique, No one in the world has ever been like

you. You are a unique individual just

like everyone else, right? It's extraordinary, but it's

also ordinary because everyone's extraordinary.

And so it's an ordinary thing to be extraordinary.

And this is what Eric Little is for us, an example of ordinary

extraordinary. Eric Little was in training.

He had been spent time in mission field already.

He was in more training and his sister thought he needed to give

up all of this silly sports stuff and just focus on the work

that God had called him to do to be a missionary to the people of

China and in the course of their time.

And we see it in the movie where Eric is talking to his sister.

He's explaining to her why he's still running and why he's doing

what he's doing. And we're going to hear an echo

of that in his mind as we watch the next clip.

We're going to hear Eric Little's voice restating some

things he said earlier in the movie earlier in his life and,

and, and what Eric did. Well, let's just watch and then

we'll then we'll talk about it together.

This is the 1924 Olympics. The story is long and it's

complex. I encourage you to watch it.

Eric qualified for the 100m race for the Olympics.

He's now, instead of running the 100 meters, he's running the 400

meters in the Olympics. He's already, this is, you know,

old days they were, they were not as gracious then as they are

now. He's running the medal round.

He's already run 2 heats the same day.

They didn't wait a day between heats.

He's run 2 heats already that day.

He's running another 400 meter heat for the medal round.

And this is what happens. What's the deal with this guy,

little coach? Your problem.

No problem. He's a flyer.

He's had two races today already.

He'll die. Just swing along, you guys and

wait. After 300 meters, rigor mortis

sets in. You'll pull him in on a rope,

John. Canada.

Canada. #4 good. Luck.

Watch out for a little. Coach, there's no problem.

He's got something to prove, something personal, something

guys like Coach will never understand me in years.

Says in the old book, He that honors me, I will honour good

luck, Pacsun shows. So where does the power come

from to see the race to its end from within?

Jenny, I believe God made me for a purpose.

He also made me fast and when I run I feel his pleasure.

There are two things that Little says that we hear in his

reflections as he's running that race. 1 is, is that where does

the power come to run the race? And here we hear it just says it

comes from within. But earlier, as he's talking

about the race and comparing the life of faith to the race, the

full quotation as he's quoting himself here is that it comes

from within. It comes from God within us, and

he explicitly identifies the powers coming from God.

And then as he's talking to his sister, he's trying to get him

to give up this silly athletic stuff and and settle down and

get about the work that God has given him as a missionary.

He says God has made me for a purpose.

God has made me for China. I believe that.

But God has also made me fast. And when I run, I feel his

pleasure. My question this morning is,

what do you do that lets you feel God's pleasure?

What is it in your life that when you do it, you feel God's

pleasure? That's what Eric that was part

of his understanding of how the Holy Spirit worked within him,

of God working through him that he could feel.

Eric did not win that race because of his running form.

His brilliant running form, that how they show him in the movie,

is how he ran. He would at some point in the

race, turn his head back, close his eyes and flail his arms.

I can tell you, I don't know if anyone's ever run track.

I was never on a track team. I can.

I will bet my next 10 paychecks that there's no track coach in

the world that will tell one of their athletes to imitate Eric

Little's running style. But he won a gold medal at the

Olympics, not because he was a brilliant athlete, but because

he was empowered by the Holy Spirit.

And he knew it was the Holy Spirit because when he ran, he

could feel God's pleasure. What is it that you do that when

you do it, you feel God's pleasure, whatever that is, do

that and keep doing that. Whatever else anyone may say

around you about it, that thing that when you do that, you're

going. I just got his.

Keep doing that and it's going to be different for different

folks. For some folks it might be

sports, some athletic or or some music, some other types of art,

some maybe teaching, some healing, some, you know, working

with children, some building, some growings.

Whatever it is, whatever it is, find that thing, if you don't

know it already, that when you do it, you feel God's pleasure

and keep doing that. Keep doing that.

That's God working in you. That's God working through you

and empowering you to do what God wants you to do.

Now God calls different people to do different things, so it's

going to be different. Don't make someone else do what

you may give just because you feel God's pleasure.

Don't make other people do that same thing just 'cause it makes

you feel God's pleasure. Let them do their thing where

they feel God's pleasure. You do yours, the Holy Spirit

will empower you to do whatever God calls you to do.

Whatever that thing is, God will give you the power to do it.

Now there are some things that are common the Holy Spirit does

in everyone that is a follower of Jesus, everyone that will

receive the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit will empower and

produce certain things in all folks.

We hear that in Galatians. Paul says this, the fruit, the

Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives.

This is for everyone. Lovejoy, peace, patience,

kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and

self-control. There is no law against these

things. In fact, I would argue that when

you encounter these in your own life or in the life of someone

else, wherever you encounter those, that is God working in

you. That is God working in that

person. That is a sign of the Holy

Spirit in their lives. When you meet someone and you

know what, this person, I just feel the love.

I just know it. They're or they just bring peace

into every situation that they enter into, or my goodness, they

are so good even when it costs them greatly or they are

faithful. They're faithful day in and day

out. All of these kinds of things.

When we see them in another, that's evidence of the Holy

Spirit in their life producing that fruit.

Now there's some things on the flip side of that that means

that we won't encounter, that we won't see growing us or

continuing to grow in US, or things that that we need to sort

of, well, as Paul says, crucify in US.

Let's not become conceited. Let's not provoke one another.

We're jealous of one another, conceit, pride, jealousy.

These things wreak havoc in the world around us.

That provoking one another, that is very that's online.

The trolling that happens, the rage baiting, the click bait I

used. I used to play those games.

I this is one of those parts of my life that I'm ashamed of.

But I, I long before the Internet, I enjoyed rage baiting

people. Oh, I love to say things that

would make people mad. Oh, and I, I could, I could

figure out what would make people mad and I would find the

right button and I would press it and I just watch them go and

I loved it. Not good.

That's not God. That wasn't God working through

me. And by the grace of God, I

believe I do less of that, significantly less than I used

to, and less and less all the time.

Since we're living by the Spirit, Paul says we need to

follow the spirits leading in every part of our lives.

Whatever we're doing, we do it with love.

Whatever we're doing, we do it with gentleness, with kindness,

with patience, with self-control, trusting that God

will bring joy into it, even into hard tasks, even in the

difficult tasks, even in the painful tasks, There can be joy

found in those things. I want to give you a personal

example as I'm wrapping things up here, and this is from Amy

and my, from our own life. And, and we might know how many

of you know already. I think I've shared before that

Amy's mom, her name was Phyllis, lived with us for three years

with Alzheimer's and then for the final year for life.

We, we moved Phyllis into an assisted living center because

the, IT became her needs became more than we could manage on our

own. It was just beyond our skill and

our abilities, but she lived with us.

And I'm going to tell you a little bit about Phyllis.

And and Phyllis would not be mad if she were here.

Phyllis was a too much information kind of person for

as all the years I knew her. You could have a 15 minute

conversation with Phyllis and you would know things about her

that only your doctor knows about you.

She was very happy to share about her own life.

So I don't think she will mind me sharing these.

Phyllis was hard to get along with before she got Alzheimer's.

And, and there was a point and, and, and even I were just

talking about this the other day in our lives.

We're in our dealings with Phyllis and in her dealings with

us and with our kids. And we looked at each other

after one of those interactions and we said together in perfect

agreement, she will never live with us.

Whatever happens to her in her old age, she will never live in

our house. And, and then we also remember

both of us vividly, the day we were sitting and talking with

Phyllis and the evidence of the Alzheimer's was undeniable.

And at that moment we looked at each other and we said she needs

to move in with us as soon as possible.

And we meant it. And that was not our will.

That was not our determination. That was the Holy Spirit.

And the Holy Spirit empowered us and enabled us to care for her

for three years. She had some health issues,

including an an ostomy bag that when you forget how to take care

of your own ostomy bag, things get tough.

And Amy cleaned up after her mother time after time after

time. And, and, and it was hard for

me. It was harder for Amy, But God

gave us what we needed to do that, as long as we needed to do

that. And one of the things, and Amy

will tell you the same thing, that that throughout that

process, we felt the power and the pleasure of God.

We knew beyond the doubt that taking care of Amy's mom was

exactly what God wanted us to be doing.

Whatever else was going on in our lives at that time.

And again, it's not because we are good people.

We, our decision was never, we'll never do this.

And God said, shut up, do what you're told and I'll help.

And we did what God said and God helped.

And we felt through the heartache, through the pain,

through the tears, through the struggle, we felt the pleasure

of God as we cared for Phyllis. And by the way, God wasn't doing

that for our benefit. Phyllis had been through a lot

in her life and had suffered a lot in her life and and she was

far from perfect, just like I'm far from perfect.

But I'm convinced that God put that in Amy and I to honor

Phyllis for her faithfulness to him throughout her life and

through her struggles to give her family to live with for as

long as possible. At the end, not to honor us, but

to honor her, God gave us that. The Holy Spirit empowered us to

do what God asked us to do, and what God asked us to do at that

point was to care for Phyllis. That's a life empowered by the

Spirit. I can't say that I live every

aspect of my life in this way. What part of what was noticeable

about those four years with Phyllis's disease was that that

how much I don't hollow the Holy Spirit and a lot, it's a lot.

I'm just like, I've got a long way to go, but I've tasted it.

Like the psalmist says, I've seen that the Lord is good.

And I'm not unique in this. Amy's not unique in this.

This is the promise God makes all of us.

Be about the work that I've given you to do and I'll give

you the power to do it and you will experience my joy, my

pleasure, as you do the work I've given you to do in Jesus

name, Amen. Amen.