[The Easter Life is] A Life Empowered (Chester UMC)

What does this mean? It's a question we're responding

to throughout the message. Today we're going to start with

a clip from one of my favorite movies based on a true story.

I've shown a clip from this before, Chariots of Fire.

I don't think I've shown this clip.

I'm actually doing 2. I don't think I've shown either

of these clips here yet. So Eric Little is is a runner

for Scotland, for Great Britain in the 1920s and he's he's

training and preparing to compete in the 1924 Olympics.

And this is a race that he ran in preparation for that.

True story. So what you're about to see

represents actual events. So let's watch together.

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. What does this mean?

What does it mean that that Eric Little got knocked to the ground

early on in 1/4 mile race and was able to come back and win

the race? What does it mean when he throws

his head back while he's running and flails his arms in a crazy

way while he's running? It means the same kind of thing,

oddly enough, that it meant when Jesus's followers, the men and

the women, gathered in the upper room 50 days after the

resurrection, when the Holy Spirit descended on them and

they began telling the good news and languages that they did not

know themselves, but the hearers, the listeners knew.

What does it mean? What it means is that this

Easter life that we're living, one of the aspects of this life,

it's absolutely essential. Without this, our Easter life

doesn't exist. But the Easter life that we live

is a life that is empowered. Empowered not by our effort, not

by our energy, not by our intelligence, not by our

talents, empowered by God, empowered by the Holy Spirit.

That is how we live this Easter life.

It's how we live a life of faith.

It's how we live a life of service.

It's how we live a life of love. It's how we live a life in a

world that's been turned upside down is through the power, the

gifting, the presence, the indwelling, and the dwelling

upon in the community of the Holy Spirit.

Jesus promised his disciples you will receive power when the Holy

Spirit falls upon you. We're going to talk about that

here today. And, and I hate to do this

again, but Star Wars, it's such a great comparison because the

story is so well known and so popular and so widespread these

days. And, and, and it provides, I

think, a, a wonderful distinction to help us

understand the Holy Spirit by contrast, because in the, in

the, the universe of Star Wars, there is a great power.

They call it the Force. And the force, you know, if

you're in the first 3 movies, it's a, it's a mystical thing

that isn't really explained. If you're in the 2nd 3 movies,

it's the midichlorians. We'll forget about the

midichlorians for now. And, and now I'm way off in the

nerd weeds. So, but there's this force, it's

got a good side and a dark side, a good side and a bad side.

It's, it's got this power, this energy that exists that that the

Jedi and the Sith, they can, they can seize hold of the

force. They can use the force to

accomplish and do amazing things.

They can move things with the Force.

They can, they can run fast with the Force.

They can, they can kind of see a little bit almost into the

future with the Force. They can, they can fly better

their spaceships with the force. The force enhances them.

It gives them power to do things that no human being, no mortal

creature could ordinarily do. And when Luke is first asking, I

don't, I don't remember this conversation was with Obi Wan or

Yoda. I kind of think it was with Yoda

and and he's asking Yoda or Obi Wan, you know, how this works?

And he says, is it do you do you control it?

And and, and, and and and Yoda says, well, yes, partly you

control it, but also it controls you.

And that's the force. That's how the force works.

It's a it's a tremendous empowerment.

If a Jedi is filled with the Force or a Sith is filled with

the Force, the Holy Spirit is not the Force.

Not at all. I love the Star Wars movies.

They're, they're fun. They are.

Well, I love the first six Star Wars movies.

They're fun, they're exciting, they're great, they're

wonderful. The Holy Spirit is not the Force

because the Force obeys the will of the Jedi.

The Force follows the command in the direction of the Sith.

Try giving the Holy Spirit orders sometimes and see how

that works out for you. The Holy Spirit does not exist

to do our will. Jedi's can control the force and

use it to do what they want to do, but the Holy Spirit empowers

us to do what God wants to do. The Holy Spirit is not our

cosmic Butler. It's it's not our power up

package that we pick up. And now suddenly we've got more

health points and more strength points and more defense points

and all of these, the whole that's not how the Holy Spirit

works. The Holy Spirit doesn't exist to

make our lives better and easier and give us the power and the

strength and the energy to do all of the things that we want

and dream of doing that would make the Holy Spirit some sort

of cosmic Butler or bellhop or our personal trainer or our

personal advisor. It's really quite the opposite.

The Holy Spirit empowers us to do God's will, to do what God

wants, not what we want, not what we want.

Take a look at Luke, What Luke Jesus says at the end of the

Gospel of Luke, Just for where? His resurrect or just after his

resurrection, repentance for that he's talking again to his

disciples. Repentance for the forgiveness

of sins will be proclaimed in his name.

Jesus is talking here, referring to himself in the third person

in Jesus name to all the nations beginning at Jerusalem.

Jesus prophesized this to his disciples on resurrection

Sunday. They've he's been to Emmaus.

Now he's gone back to Jerusalem and met the disciples in the

upper room, and he tells them that this is what's going to

happen. All nations beginning in

Jerusalem, all nations will hear the good news, the good news of

forgiveness of sins through repentance in Acts.

He says it this way just before he ascends.

This is 50 days later. I don't know.

This is a little less than 50 days later.

Pentecost was actually 50 days later, but this is might have

been right around today because next week is Pentecost.

Jesus says you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has

come on you and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and the

ends of the earth. Said same phrase starting in

Jerusalem, going to the ends of the earth.

There's more stuff in it, he adds in there.

Samaria and Judea he puts in there when he's talking to them

and just before his ascension. But the Holy Spirit's going to

come and this thing that I've already told you about, you're

going to be my witnesses all throughout the world, all

throughout the world. Now let's remember who the

disciples were and who Jesus was talking to.

These were not highly educated people.

These were just regular folks. These were working class folks.

Many of them were women and, and, and, and would have had

most likely less education than the men.

None of them were world travelers.

And Israel existed at the crossroads of great

civilizations of the world. They would have known folks

traveling through Israel. They would have encountered

people from India, maybe perhaps even China.

They would have encountered people from from Rome and from

from parts other parts of Europe.

They would have encountered people from the great

civilizations of Africa, Egypt, and Ethiopia.

They would have encountered all of these and known that there

were wildly different cultures of wildly different people

speaking wildly different languages.

And Jesus has told them, you are going to be my witnesses to the

ends of the earth everywhere in the world.

The disciples were not prepared for this assignment.

They were not adequate to this assignment.

They would almost certainly have been wondering how is this even

going to be possible. We don't even have where are we

going to get the money to go to the ends of the earth?

And once we're there, how are we going to tell people that we

can't understand and they can't understand us about the good

news of Jesus. They they were almost certainly

asking themselves these kinds of questions.

How can this possibly be and Jesus had given them the answer.

Although again, as as always is when God is leading us, even

though we know the words we really don't understand, until

it happens, the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit's going to fall upon

you and you will receive power. Not power to do everything

you've ever wanted to do, not power to live your best life

now, not power to be the best you you can be.

You will receive the power to do what I've told you to do.

You will receive power to live out the prophecies that I have

made about you. That is the power that you will

receive. And we see it happening right

there on the day of Pentecost. All of this was in Jerusalem.

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

in other tongues as the Spirit enabled them.

They were staying in there were staying in Jerusalem, God

fearing Jews from every nation under heaven.

When they heard this sound, a crowd came together and

bewilderment because each one heard their own language being

spoken. That's just this is how it

works, beginning in Jerusalem where because of the the feast

of Pentecost that's being celebrated.

They're Jews from all over the world here right now, and you

can see it and experience it with your own eyes.

You speak the good news and they hear in their own language.

Because the Holy Spirit has come, the Holy Spirit has filled

you, the Holy Spirit has fallen upon you, and the Holy Spirit

has given you power to do my will in ways that are beyond

your own capacity. This is the empowered life that

we're called to. We're not called to be Jedi, to

go out and use the Holy Spirit to accomplish good in the world.

We are called to surrender to and receive the Holy Spirit.

And so we can be guided by the Holy Spirit to do God's work in

the world, whatever work that God gives us to do.

Now I got to double check to see where I am yet.

Not quite there yet, OK? The Holy Spirit empowers us to

do what God wants. What God wants.

The Holy Spirit does not power everyone to do the same thing

though. Again, with Jedi, with Jedi,

when you look at the Jedi and you look at the Sith, they all

have the same, some of them have a few things that they can do

that maybe other folks can't do as well, but they all basically

the same skill set. And, and the Jedi all had kind

of 1 mission. They were, they were sort of

the, the, the Guardians of the Galaxy, although I know that's a

different cinematic universe. They were, they were there to

protect and defend justice and rightness in the Galaxy and the

Sith. We're there to, you know,

dominate and control and rule and destroy and those kinds of

things. But they all could do the same

basic kinds of things. The Holy Spirit doesn't empower

every one of us to do the exact same thing.

We are individual people. We're like members of a body,

you know, not the some parts of the body.

The hand doesn't do the same things the heart does.

The heart doesn't do the same thing the knees do.

The lungs don't do the same thing the ears do.

And each of us as followers of Jesus Christ, we don't do the

same thing that everyone else does.

God gives us, some of us some. Well, God gives us the things

that each of us as individuals, the things that we need, the

power that we need to do what God has called us as individuals

to do and to be what God has called us as individuals to be.

And that can be wildly different things.

I think I'm at where I think I'm supposed to be.

Nope. I got one more, one more.

This brings us back to Eric Little and and his ordinary

extraordinary example. Extraordinary because what Eric

Little did I think is extraordinary, Maybe not to the

same degree of extraordinary as the Day of Pentecost itself, but

certainly well beyond the ordinary.

It's ordinary because God does this a lot, not identically the

same thing in every person, but this is the sort of thing we can

expect from the Holy Spirit. Now we're asking what what is

Eric Little's race that we saw there at the beginning?

What does this have to do with the power of the Holy Spirit

living in the Spirit empowered life?

Little talks about that himself. And and then we're going to want

to watch a clip. We're, we're going to watch a

clip that's actually from the 1924 Olympics where Eric Little

is running in the 400 meters, not his event.

Why he's running an event that wasn't his event is a longer

story. Watch the movie, you'll get

that. But he's running the 400 meters.

He trained for the Olympics for the 100 meters and, and as he

runs, we're going to hear his thoughts.

And as we hear his thoughts, we're hearing things that he

actually said earlier in the movie when he was talking to his

sister and and a friend. Eric Little was in training to

be a missionary and he had been a missionary in China.

He was back in Scotland, he was planning to go back to China and

his sister and his friends from the mission field thought that

his time spent running and playing rugby as he was also a

rugby player. Skinny little guy for a rugby

player, right? I think he was bigger in real

life than the actor was. They thought it was a waste of

time, a frivolous waste of effort, a frivolous waste of

energy that was distracting him from the work that God has given

him to do. We're going to watch this clip

that we're going to talk a little bit more about Eric

Little's example. Let's let's watch together.

My computer has been doing weird things with the volume, so I'm

going to do that and we should be good.

Good luck, don't expect I'll see you till after the race.

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. Good luck.

Watch out for a little. Coach says no problem.

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

guys like Coach will never understand.

Says in the old book, he that honours me, I will honour good

luck. Jackson Shores.

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. The quotes we hear in his head

are partial quotes from what he said earlier in the movie when

he talks about where does the power come from, it comes from

within this full quotation. What he said earlier in the

movie and made perfectly clear was it comes from within, from

God dwelling within us. And when he said God made me for

a purpose, he said, God, Jenny, you're talking to his sister

Jenny. God made, I know God made me for

a purpose. God made me for China, but God

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

pleasure, his throwing his head back.

There's not a track coach in the world that will ever tell one of

their athletes to imitate Eric Little's running style.

He threw his head back, closed his eyes and flailed his arms as

he won a gold medal. And that's how he ran, as an act

of worship and an act of praise, feeling the pleasure of God.

So my question for you is what? What do you do that lets you

feel God's pleasure? It's probably not going to be

the same thing as the person sitting next to you.

Some, some of you wouldn't. It might be might be sports, it

might be. It might be.

It might be some sort of book worker academically, it might be

some kind of of skill or talent you use caring for others.

Maybe it's teaching, maybe it's healing, maybe it's serving,

maybe it's building, maybe it's growing.

What? I don't know what it is.

I don't know what it is, but what do you do that lets you

feel God's pleasure? Whatever that is, do that.

Do that. No matter what folks around you

say, do that. Now listen to your parents.

You got to throw. I don't want to get in trouble,

you know, just wait till they're not looking.

Then it wasn't a waste of time. It wasn't a distraction from his

purpose. Eric Little went on to go on

China, had a very effective, very tremendous ministry in

China where he experienced some great suffering as World War 2

came along. Why did God make Eric fast?

Why did he give him that gift? Why did he empower him to run

that way? And Eric himself will tell you

that his winning that gold medal was not his power.

It was the power of God in him. Why I, I don't know.

I don't know. I know it's an amazing story.

I know it's a tremendous witness of the good news and the power

and the grace of God through Jesus Christ.

But why that and not something else?

I why the thing for you and not something else?

I don't know. I don't know.

God doesn't give us all the same thing.

God doesn't make us all tremendous athletes, doesn't

give us all the gift for singing, the gift of music.

God doesn't for each individuals, and God gives us

what we need in order to do what God has called us to do,

whatever that thing is. God calls different people to do

different things. And so we got to let other

people do their thing while we do the thing that when we do it,

we feel God's pleasure. We feel God's joy in our life.

We got to be careful. It's not just something that we

like and something that makes us happy, that there's a difference

between feeling happy and feeling God's pleasure, but we

can work those things out. The Holy Spirit will guide us in

that, and we got to let other people do their thing as well.

At the same time, there are some things that the Holy Spirit

empowers you to do whatever God calls you to do.

There's some things that are across the board for followers

of Jesus Christ. We get this promise when the

Holy Spirit falls upon us, when the Holy Spirit fills us.

These are the things that God we can.

These are signs, evidence of the Holy Spirit and anyone and

everyone. And essentially Paul is saying

in that letter to the Galatians that that Elena read earlier

that that when you see this in people, this is a sign of God.

This is evidence of the Holy Spirit in their life.

What is the Holy Spirit empowers all to do whatever our specific

calling is, these common things that we have, the Holy Spirit

produces this kind of fruit in our lives.

Love. That screen just went blank.

It didn't stop at love I'm oh there, it's back.

Wow, weird hasn't done that. Lovejoy, peace, patience,

kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and

self-control. And by the way, there is no law

against doing any of these things.

Paul says he was writing to the Galatians.

They were, they were sliding back into legalism or sliding

into legalism. And they're like, we can't do

these things because the law says we can't eat that with law

says we can't go hang out with these folks.

And, and, and Paul says, you know what?

There is no law that says you can't love someone.

There is no law against joy, peace, patience, kindness,

goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.

This is what the Holy Spirit produces in us.

There are some folks that that that say when they read this

list that that's really just one fruit because the Greek is

singular. It's not the fruits of the Holy

Spirit. Paul says the fruit of the Holy

Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, and, and, and there's

some folks that say that love is the fruit of the Holy Spirit and

all of those other words are just descriptors of love.

It is loving with joy, loving with peace, loving patiently and

kindly, and loving with goodness, loving faithfully,

loving gently, and loving with self-control.

However, you read it as a bunch of different things or one thing

with different aspects. It's all empowered by the Holy

Spirit and and that fruit and that empowerment often comes

together with that, that sense of joy and giving God's

pleasure. I want to give you an example

from my life and Amy's life and and she, she had something else

she had to tend to this morning and she's not here.

She didn't know I was going to tell this.

If you tell her and she gets mad, you didn't hear it from me.

But we had Amy's mom who lived with us for three years and then

was in an assisted living for three years, and she had

Alzheimer's when she was with us.

And I'm going to say this. Amy's mom's name is Phyllis.

Phyllis lived a too much information kind of life.

You could spend 15 minutes with Phyllis and know things about

her that only your doctor knows about you.

So I'm I'm going to be over sharing a little bit here.

Phyllis wouldn't mind. That's how she lived.

Phyllis was a hard person to get along with.

And there was a point a few years earlier on when when we

were interacting with Phyllis and I looked over at Amy after

Phyllis had left, and I said, I don't care what happens to her.

She is never living with us. And Amy agreed.

She's like, yeah, you're right, you're right, you're right.

But there was a moment when we saw the Alzheimer's, we saw the

disease, and it was undeniable. And we looked at each other and

we said she needs to come live with us.

And there was not a moment's hesitation.

I make promises all the time that God says shut up.

Just stop talking, Blevins. You're just embarrassing

yourself. You might be thinking that right

now. We had said deaf.

Never, never. Phyllis is not an easy person to

get along with, but we knew we needed to and and she moved in

with us. And I don't know how.

If you've spent a lot of time caring for someone with

Alzheimer's, it's the hardest thing we have ever done in our

lives by far. And it was a period in our lives

when we were both absolutely convinced on the hardest of days

that we were doing exactly what God wanted us to do.

And we experienced throughout that time the power of the Holy

Spirit to do it. Because I can swear to you on

the Bible that what we did for her I could not do on my own

strength. It's not in me to do that.

And yet we did that. And, and I believe that that was

the Holy Spirit working in us to, as Jackson Schultz wrote in

that note to Eric Little, to honor those who honor him.

And Phyllis was not a perfect person, but she worked really

hard in her life to honor God. And I believe the whole reason

that God gave that to us was so that God could care for Phyllis

and provide a place for her, not for us.

But we had that ongoing, what is hard?

There were tears, there was anger, there was frustration.

But through it all, there was that sense of God's pleasure of

when we're cleaning up the messes.

We were feeling God's pleasure when we were telling her the bad

news for the 10th time in a week that she had Alzheimer's.

We were it hurt, but there was that sense of God saying this is

right, this is what you need to be doing right now, and I'm

giving you everything you need to do it.

And when it was done and Phyllis passed on, it was the the

exhaustion was real. But it's the Holy Spirit that's

a it's not the happiness. Taking care of a loved one with

Alzheimer's is not an occasion for happiness, but the pleasure

and the joy of God were there. And, and and it's hard, but I I

was at that gone a couple times for spiritual retreat to a

monastery. Jesuit monastery or not, it's

not Jesuit. I've forgotten which Benedictine

maybe in New York and got spiritual direction from one of

the monks there at one point. And I was whining about

something, I can't remember what.

I was whining about how hard something in life was.

This old guy looks at me and said, yeah, he said, you suppose

it was uncomfortable for Jesus being crucified?

All right, fine, if that's where you're going.

It's not about us being comfortable.

Jesus suffered in his faithful obedience to God, but God

sustained him through that. And it's the same for what God

calls us. It's not about being

comfortable. It's not about being happy.

It's not about doing the thing that makes us feel

self-righteous and morally superior.

It's about God giving us the power to do whatever God calls

us to do as a church and as individuals.

That is the spirit filled life. That is a spirit empowered life.

And that means surrendering things like seek conceit and

jealousy and envy and and pride, letting go of all of those

things because those are incompatible with a life of love

and they're incompatible with a life empowered by the Holy

Spirit. It's about surrendering every

part of our lives. Let us follow the spirits

leading in every part of our lives, whether it's when we're

alone, or when we're with family or friends, or at work or at

school or at church, wherever it is, even at the ball games, no

matter how bad the refs are. We live by the Spirit following

the spirits leading in every part of our lives.

This is the Easter life, a life empowered by the Holy Spirit to

do whatever God calls us to do, wherever God calls us to do it,

in Jesus name. Amen.

Amen.