The Book of Acts Part 1 I Pastor Joshua Gay

[SPEAKER_00]: High-braze podcast.

[SPEAKER_00]: Hey everybody, this is Pastor Josh.

[SPEAKER_00]: We'll leave Pastor here at High-braze and I want to thank you for downloading today's podcast.

[SPEAKER_00]: We know that this message is going to encourage and bless you.

[SPEAKER_00]: So I want you to open up your heart and receive with the Lord as for you today.

[SPEAKER_00]: Gary Bible, go to Acts chapter one.

[SPEAKER_00]: We're going to be starting a new series tonight on the Book of Acts.

[SPEAKER_00]: We're going to talk about the Book of Acts for until we're done, and it's going to be great.

[SPEAKER_00]: And I have a word as we kind of start this that I really believe is going to be good for us in this season as we start.

[SPEAKER_00]: This journey through this book and right at the at the top before we even read this text I want us to understand a few things that while we certainly believe acts the book of acts is historical

[SPEAKER_00]: I said, we believe the Book of Acts is historical, yes.

[SPEAKER_00]: In other words, we believe all of this actually really happened.

[SPEAKER_00]: We believe this is a historical account of what happened.

[SPEAKER_00]: But I want us to understand that the Book of Acts is not just a historical account of what the apostles did.

[SPEAKER_00]: I don't want to go too far down this rabbit hole, but some of you, if you have an actual Bible,

[SPEAKER_00]: at the top of the heading of the book of Acts, it may say something like the Acts of the Apostles.

[SPEAKER_00]: You may have a Bible that says that.

[SPEAKER_00]: I want to just, that obviously is not in the original.

[SPEAKER_00]: Man you scripts that we, or the oldest men you scripts we have, that was added there by translators at the beginning Luke didn't put it at the top but the acts of the apostles because he had no idea or way of even understanding what we would have today in a Bible.

[SPEAKER_00]: But I want to just challenge you with this that this is really more than just the acts of the apostles.

[SPEAKER_00]: It is the acts of the early church.

[SPEAKER_00]: because it's not just telling us what the apostles did, it's telling us what the church did.

[SPEAKER_00]: And by the way, there are miracles about people who aren't only apostles, there are miracles by decans in the book of Acts.

[SPEAKER_00]: It is the acts of the early church and the way that they function, but this is more than just dead history.

[SPEAKER_00]: Acts is an account of what risen Jesus continued to do

[SPEAKER_00]: What we're reading is an account of the continuation of the ministry of Jesus.

[SPEAKER_00]: It tells us how the church continue to act, operate, and proceed.

[SPEAKER_00]: I know what you don't understand.

[SPEAKER_00]: The ministry of Jesus did not end with His ascension.

[SPEAKER_00]: What Jesus is doing in the earth did not end with His ascension.

[SPEAKER_00]: It continued through men and women in the book of Acts.

[SPEAKER_00]: It continues throughout the first century.

[SPEAKER_00]: It continues on into the second, third, fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh, eighth, ninth, fifth all the way up until the modern day.

[SPEAKER_00]: And the ministry and the work of Jesus is not done.

[SPEAKER_00]: It is still being done and still being accomplished through His church.

[SPEAKER_00]: Well, Pastor didn't Jesus say it was finished.

[SPEAKER_00]: Yes, he was talking about the defeat of death and hell.

[SPEAKER_00]: He was not talking about the completion of all of his expression of what he was going to do, because Jesus is still working today.

[SPEAKER_00]: My say again, Jesus is still working today.

[SPEAKER_00]: And now he works through me and he works through you.

[SPEAKER_00]: We are continuing to work at his body.

[SPEAKER_00]: Jesus went up, but the church was about to be filled.

[SPEAKER_00]: Jesus sat down at the right hand of the Father, but his work was not completed or finished in the earth.

[SPEAKER_00]: He's going to continue his work through his body.

[SPEAKER_00]: And tonight where I really want to start this off kind of is us understanding this fact.

[SPEAKER_00]: Because now how I am, because we're a good Pentecostal Christians, and whenever we hear the book of Acts, we're like blessed God, here we go.

[SPEAKER_00]: The wind is coming and the fire is about to fall and thousands of people are about to get saved and blind people are about to see and lame people are about to walk and Peter's gonna do some weird stuff and tell people to shut up and all sorts of crazy stuff's gonna happen.

[SPEAKER_00]: Right?

[SPEAKER_00]: That's what we think.

[SPEAKER_00]: But I want you to understand

[SPEAKER_00]: Act starts with them being obedient.

[SPEAKER_00]: And if we want the power and we want the wind, more than we want to be obedient to the voice of Jesus, we won't get the fire and we won't get the wind.

[SPEAKER_00]: We so often have made the fire and the wind our main goal and when the fire and the wind is your goal, you don't get the fire and the wind.

[SPEAKER_00]: You might get craziness, but you don't get fire and wind.

[SPEAKER_00]: Right?

[SPEAKER_00]: If we want the fire of the Holy Ghost and we want the wind of the Spirit, then we must start from living in a place of obedience, because before there was power, there was obedience, before there was fire, there was surrender, or before there was wind, there was waiting.

[SPEAKER_00]: And we don't like that.

[SPEAKER_00]: Just like we talked about on Sunday, we are this instant gratification give it to me now generation, right?

[SPEAKER_00]: Come on, you don't look at me that ton of voice.

[SPEAKER_00]: I'll know exactly what I'm talking about.

[SPEAKER_00]: You ever like set down a direction and it took more than like three minutes to get like a waiter or a waitress and get a drink and you're like what's wrong with these people?

[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I don't look at me that ton of voice.

[SPEAKER_00]: I know exactly what you all've done.

[SPEAKER_00]: You've ever gone in order to get stuck in the married couples are just pointing at each others.

[SPEAKER_00]: Like probably both of you all praise God.

[SPEAKER_00]: You've ever been in a drive through and it wasn't very fast and you get very frustrated because we want what we want and we want it right now when if we have to wait we are not good at that.

[SPEAKER_00]: There's a fly up here.

[SPEAKER_00]: Praise God.

[SPEAKER_00]: Domonic.

[SPEAKER_00]: You just have to be around here.

[SPEAKER_00]: Satan's attacking the message, praise God, but the Lord of the flies, praise God, if there's one thing that we know, there's one thing that I know about Christians is that we can be some of the most impatient bunch that there is, but the church was not birthed in impatience.

[SPEAKER_00]: The church was birthed in waiting.

[SPEAKER_00]: We immediately jump to Acts 2.

[SPEAKER_00]: But if you want Acts 2, you've got to live in Acts 1.

[SPEAKER_00]: Because you don't get to Acts 2, unless you first go through Acts 1.

[SPEAKER_00]: We love the Acts 2 fire, but we can't skip Acts 1 obedience.

[SPEAKER_00]: We want the sound of the sound of the mighty rushing wind.

[SPEAKER_00]: But before the wind blew, they had to walk back to Jerusalem.

[SPEAKER_00]: We're gonna see that in just a minute.

[SPEAKER_00]: Acts chapter one, verse one, says this.

[SPEAKER_00]: The former account, a made of theophilus of all that Jesus began, both to do and teach, until the day in which he was taken up.

[SPEAKER_00]: After he threw the Holy Spirit, had given commandments to the apostles whom he had chosen.

[SPEAKER_00]: to whom he also presented himself alive after his suffering by many infallible proofs, being seen by them during 40 days and speaking of the things pertaining to the kingdom of God.

[SPEAKER_00]: Just pause there for a second.

[SPEAKER_00]: I do want to make a note here so I don't forget.

[SPEAKER_00]: And that is this.

[SPEAKER_00]: In first Corinthians, we actually see recorded that Jesus appeared to at least 500 people.

[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, at least 500 people.

[SPEAKER_00]: That's what First Corinthians records, verse four.

[SPEAKER_00]: And being a symbol together with them, he commanded them not to depart from Jerusalem.

[SPEAKER_00]: But what do what?

[SPEAKER_00]: Wait.

[SPEAKER_00]: for the promise of the Father, which he said you have heard for me for John truly baptized with water, but you shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit, not many days from now.

[SPEAKER_00]: Therefore when they had come together, they asked him saying, Lord, will you at this time restore the kingdom of Israel?

[SPEAKER_00]: And he said to them, it is not for you to know the times or seasons which the Father has put in his own authority, but you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit is going upon you.

[SPEAKER_00]: You're looking for the restoration of a city, and I am looking to restore something in you.

[SPEAKER_00]: and you shall be witnesses to me in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria into the end of the earth, first night.

[SPEAKER_00]: Now, when he had spoken these things, while they watched, he was taken up and a cloud received him out of their sight.

[SPEAKER_00]: And while they looked steadfastly toward heaven, as he went up, behold, two men stood by them and wide a peril, who also said, men of Galilee, why do you stand gazing up into the heaven?

[SPEAKER_00]: This same Jesus who was taken up from you into heaven will so come in like the manner

[SPEAKER_00]: Verse 12, then they returned to Jerusalem.

[SPEAKER_00]: from the Mount called all of that, which is near Jerusalem a Sabbath day journey.

[SPEAKER_00]: And when they had entered, they went up into the upper room where they were staying, Peter James, John, and Andrew, Philippe and Thomas, Bartholomew, and Matthew.

[SPEAKER_00]: James is Son of Alphayus, and Simon is Elit, and Judas is Son of James.

[SPEAKER_00]: These all continue to one accord in prayer and supplication with the women and Mary, the mother of Jesus, and with his brothers.

[SPEAKER_00]: So as we read this, it really is interesting to me a lot of times people read acts and they go realize that Jesus is even like a lot of believers when you talk to them, they think there is no acts one we just start next to.

[SPEAKER_00]: We start in the upper room, but that's not what we start.

[SPEAKER_00]: We start with Jesus still on the earth.

[SPEAKER_00]: And Acts 1, Jesus is resurrected, but He has not ascended yet.

[SPEAKER_00]: He is still on the earth, He is teaching, He is showing Himself, and Luke is telling us about all of this.

[SPEAKER_00]: And Acts doesn't begin with a human organization.

[SPEAKER_00]: It doesn't begin with a committee.

[SPEAKER_00]: It doesn't begin with a great strategy for the church.

[SPEAKER_00]: Acts begins with the risen Christ.

[SPEAKER_00]: And I say that to point this out, if we believe that Acts is a model, and it is the beginning, it is the prototype of what the church is supposed to be.

[SPEAKER_00]: If the book of Acts starts with Jesus, then we can't start with the strategy.

[SPEAKER_00]: And we can't start with the committee.

[SPEAKER_00]: And we can't start with a good plan, and we can't start with screens and lights.

[SPEAKER_00]: There's nothing that's inherently evil with any of these things, but if we don't start with Jesus, just like the Book of Acts starts with Jesus.

[SPEAKER_00]: If we don't start with an empty grave, we're starting in the wrong place to begin with.

[SPEAKER_00]: If we start based upon my wisdom, we're gonna be in trouble.

[SPEAKER_00]: If we start on the wisdom of the apostles, back back up, obviously there is wisdom in the apostles here.

[SPEAKER_00]: We know that.

[SPEAKER_00]: But even with that, and we're here because the apostles told us.

[SPEAKER_00]: Amen.

[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you for that overwhelming response.

[SPEAKER_00]: We are here today.

[SPEAKER_00]: Jesus didn't appear in the flesh to any of us.

[SPEAKER_00]: We are here today because somebody told somebody about Jesus, and we've been telling people about Him for 2,000 years.

[SPEAKER_00]: So we are thankful for that, but at the end of the day, all of it's always points back to who.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's not a trick question.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's all point to back to who.

[SPEAKER_00]: Jesus, and if we are not built upon, and if Jesus is not the cornerstone, and if we don't start with Jesus to begin with, we ain't gonna make it.

[SPEAKER_00]: Acts begins with a risen Jesus, and Luke begins to tell us all that Jesus began to do in teaching, that word began is massive, because he doesn't say, Jesus taught, he says,

[SPEAKER_00]: I said, Jesus is still teaching us today.

[SPEAKER_00]: I want to be clear, the church is not a replacement of Jesus.

[SPEAKER_00]: The church is the hands and the feet of Jesus.

[SPEAKER_00]: We are His active hands and feet in the earth still today.

[SPEAKER_00]: The church is not simply trying to keep a memory alive.

[SPEAKER_00]: There's a difference between keeping his memory alive and participating in the divine life with him and being part of his hands and feet that are reaching into a world.

[SPEAKER_00]: And we do that, obviously, with the teaching of the word, we do that when we lay hands on people.

[SPEAKER_00]: We do that when we encourage people.

[SPEAKER_00]: But you know what else we do?

[SPEAKER_00]: We do that whenever Cody celebrating a year of sobriety.

[SPEAKER_00]: And we're like praise God, man.

[SPEAKER_00]: That's being the hands and feet of Jesus.

[SPEAKER_00]: We are the hands and feet of Jesus whenever we go and scoop potatoes and chicken for calorie elementary school, right?

[SPEAKER_00]: We are that grandpa is the hands and feet of Jesus.

[SPEAKER_00]: I'm gonna say it whenever he's turning chicks on in the morning.

[SPEAKER_00]: Some of y'all are really confused right now.

[SPEAKER_00]: I'll explain, this is my grandpa down here.

[SPEAKER_00]: He's about to be 84 years old, praise God.

[SPEAKER_00]: For years and years, he owned a catering business and smoked chicken was one of his things.

[SPEAKER_00]: And if he said, how you doing today's album, and how have a good day's been?

[SPEAKER_00]: Turnin' chicks on, it's cooking chicken, folks.

[SPEAKER_00]: Sometimes he would say Rubbin butts, when he was cooking pork, praise God.

[SPEAKER_00]: All right, y'all explain it, too.

[SPEAKER_00]: If they don't know what I'm talking about, it's all right.

[SPEAKER_00]: But I want you to hear me.

[SPEAKER_00]: When grabs at 84 years old is standing over the grill, cooking chicken,

[SPEAKER_00]: For some people, that's being the hands and feet of Jesus.

[SPEAKER_00]: Can I just say this?

[SPEAKER_00]: I want you to hear me really, really well.

[SPEAKER_00]: And I am as Pentecostal lay hands.

[SPEAKER_00]: I'm going to shout, yell, scream.

[SPEAKER_00]: I'm spitting the whole time I'm preaching and all that.

[SPEAKER_00]: You'll probably get hit with it.

[SPEAKER_00]: Don't worry.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's annoying to be all right.

[SPEAKER_00]: But I want you to hear me.

[SPEAKER_00]: Pentecostals have been so, let me back up, because actually historically, Pentecostals haven't been this way.

[SPEAKER_00]: But in the modern world that we live in, in modernity, Pentecostals have been this way.

[SPEAKER_00]: We have made ministry what happens here and what happens here, right?

[SPEAKER_00]: And we have not made ministry whenever we are bearing each other's burdens.

[SPEAKER_00]: And that's being the hands and feet of Jesus just as much as prophesying.

[SPEAKER_00]: Right?

[SPEAKER_00]: It is just as much to be the hands and feet of Jesus to sit around in a circle of a group of people in CR who are going through some issues and hearing each other who I'm proud of you.

[SPEAKER_00]: You got this.

[SPEAKER_00]: That's being the hands and feet of Jesus.

[SPEAKER_00]: It is just as much being the hands and feet of Jesus of giving a rather for teacher a gift card and saying we love you and we got your back.

[SPEAKER_00]: that is ministry, that is the hands and feet of Jesus, that is love in action every bit as much as intercession, as preaching, as prophesying, as being on the worship team.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's just a different expression, but that expression is no less important than the other.

[SPEAKER_00]: And the church says, when Miss Linda shows up every week and cleans bathrooms, like a ninja,

[SPEAKER_00]: because she is so quiet and just gets it done.

[SPEAKER_00]: And those bathrooms are never cleaner than when Miss Linda cleans them, that's being the hands and feet of Jesus.

[SPEAKER_00]: That's a continuation of his ministry in the earth.

[SPEAKER_00]: We've got to stop this superstar,

[SPEAKER_00]: idolization culture that makes one thing the pinnacle, but bearing someone's burden is like how that's just over that.

[SPEAKER_00]: If you're over that, you don't need to be up here?

[SPEAKER_00]: I gotta keep going.

[SPEAKER_00]: The church is doing more than just keeping a memory alive.

[SPEAKER_00]: Jesus healed and Luke and Jesus keeps healing in Acts.

[SPEAKER_00]: Jesus preached the kingdom in Luke and Jesus keeps preaching the kingdom in Acts.

[SPEAKER_00]: Jesus delivered the bound and acts and Jesus keeps delivering the bound.

[SPEAKER_00]: I should mean in Luke, but he keeps delivering the bound and acts.

[SPEAKER_00]: Jesus touched the broken and Luke and he keeps touching the broken and acts.

[SPEAKER_00]: Jesus reached the outsiders and Luke and he keeps doing this and acts.

[SPEAKER_00]: Even though he is off the scene and he has ascended, he now says, church, you are my hands.

[SPEAKER_00]: You are my feet.

[SPEAKER_00]: You are the continuation of what I've already began.

[SPEAKER_00]: And now I'm giving the baton to you.

[SPEAKER_00]: I am firmly convinced.

[SPEAKER_00]: This is the reason when Jesus has talked to the apostles, he says this, greater works I do.

[SPEAKER_00]: The works I do, you will do also.

[SPEAKER_00]: And greater, I want you to think about that for just a second.

[SPEAKER_00]: Just think about this for a second.

[SPEAKER_00]: Jesus says you're gonna do greater works and people have been like, what's greater?

[SPEAKER_00]: There's really nothing greater.

[SPEAKER_00]: Then what Jesus did, am I saying Jesus was lying?

[SPEAKER_00]: No, I'm saying we've misunderstood what He's saying.

[SPEAKER_00]: Right?

[SPEAKER_00]: We have misapplied what He's saying.

[SPEAKER_00]: And this is how people get weird.

[SPEAKER_00]: Because Jesus healed the leper.

[SPEAKER_00]: That's a pretty big deal.

[SPEAKER_00]: That means He's curing incurable diseases.

[SPEAKER_00]: Right?

[SPEAKER_00]: Jesus literally resurrects the dead.

[SPEAKER_00]: There is no force or power on the planet more final and definite than death.

[SPEAKER_00]: And Jesus beats that.

[SPEAKER_00]: Jesus himself resurrects from the grave.

[SPEAKER_00]: There is no event in our history bigger than that, right?

[SPEAKER_00]: So this is where people get weird and they start talking about they're gonna emanate energy that's gonna power a city.

[SPEAKER_00]: Y'all think I'm playing, I'm dead serious.

[SPEAKER_00]: Or this is where they start doing things like running at fences, trying to figure out how they're going to be able to go through the fence and make themselves invisible and go through objects that are solid, y'all think that's just a good way to get a concussion.

[SPEAKER_00]: Y'all think I met, these are actual, real things that I've heard people talk about.

[SPEAKER_00]: The cities in the future aren't going to need power grade because we are going to become the energy source and power as we radiate his power and his light and we're going to power the whole city grid.

[SPEAKER_00]: This isn't about getting a portal that you can time travel in.

[SPEAKER_00]: something else I've heard.

[SPEAKER_00]: That is not the greater works Jesus is talking about.

[SPEAKER_00]: You know what Jesus is doing?

[SPEAKER_00]: Jesus is saying what I am doing.

[SPEAKER_00]: The Spirit is gonna come on all of y'all, right?

[SPEAKER_00]: And Jesus was in a mortal body who's in a human body, which means there was one Jesus who could be one place at one time.

[SPEAKER_00]: But He says, I'm now going to ascend and the same spirit that raised me is going to be in you, therefore it's going to be greater because there's a lot more of us now to continue the working of Jesus.

[SPEAKER_00]: He's not saying, EJ, I was pretty great, but DJ, you're going to be greater than me.

[SPEAKER_00]: Nobody's saying his EJ and Kyle and Steve and Grandma and Nancy are going to do the greater works.

[SPEAKER_00]: Are you with me?

[SPEAKER_00]: Because there's a church that God is raising up to be his hands and feet in the earth.

[SPEAKER_00]: You get something out of this?

[SPEAKER_00]: I hope this makes it sense to you.

[SPEAKER_00]: Jesus was ascended, but his ministry keeps moving.

[SPEAKER_00]: Jesus sits down at the right hand of the Father, but the church is about to stand up.

[SPEAKER_00]: And this is why the church matters.

[SPEAKER_00]: We're not just gathering.

[SPEAKER_00]: We're not just an audience.

[SPEAKER_00]: We are his body in the air.

[SPEAKER_00]: And this is why the local church is important because I talked about this, I think, and make the church weird again last whenever we did it, but I don't know when that was some point to last year.

[SPEAKER_00]: But we as a local body are a physical expression of the invisible mystery, of the corporate body of Christ, right?

[SPEAKER_00]: This is, all right, Kyle's encouraged to me, that's bad.

[SPEAKER_00]: This is why the early fathers would say things like, no man can have the church as his father without the, because we can have God as his father without the church as his mother.

[SPEAKER_00]: That's what the early father said.

[SPEAKER_00]: You, no man can have God as his father without having the church as his mother.

[SPEAKER_00]: That we are called to be joined and joined to the body.

[SPEAKER_00]: I am the church.

[SPEAKER_00]: No, you're not.

[SPEAKER_00]: That's one of the stupidest things we say.

[SPEAKER_00]: I don't need the church.

[SPEAKER_00]: I am the church.

[SPEAKER_00]: No, we are the church.

[SPEAKER_00]: No one individually is the church.

[SPEAKER_00]: You are part of the church, but nobody is the church.

[SPEAKER_00]: Do you realize what an arrogant statement that is?

[SPEAKER_00]: I am the church.

[SPEAKER_00]: No, you are part of the church.

[SPEAKER_00]: You are a small part, but we see a lot of humility.

[SPEAKER_00]: I mentioned this on Sunday, but our parents are in Europe right now, they sent me a picture from a cathedral that was 200 years old.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's still being built, which is crazy.

[SPEAKER_00]: They need to pick it up.

[SPEAKER_00]: those timelines are not acceptable, are they Jeff, phrase got it and it was beautiful and gorgeous and in those moments it makes you if those moments don't make you stop and appreciate the grandioseness.

[SPEAKER_00]: of the church and who we are.

[SPEAKER_00]: Few years ago, we were in New York City and I walked into St. Patts, which is right there right across from 30 rock, right across from NBC.

[SPEAKER_00]: We walked into St. Gilles, like, yep, that's exactly where it's at.

[SPEAKER_00]: Gilles and New York, he's like, that's right, praise God.

[SPEAKER_00]: Well, it's into St. Patts one night, just to check it out, and in St. Patts' cathedral, I walked around the cathedral in tears, like, just weeping.

[SPEAKER_00]: And the reason I was weeping is because of what I saw when you walked in,

[SPEAKER_00]: New York City is right there basically close to Times Square right in the middle of everything and you walk through St. Pat's and there's these people in all these different groups that are sitting in this massive cathedral and There's a group over here that's talking and singing in Spanish and There's a group over here that's praying in Mandarin and Then there's a group over here in English that are gathered together and you hear all these languages from literally all over the world

[SPEAKER_00]: that are gathered together, all worshiping the same God, in a different tongue.

[SPEAKER_00]: And if those moments don't make you stop and drop this, I am the church.

[SPEAKER_00]: We are part of the church.

[SPEAKER_00]: It is so much bigger than me.

[SPEAKER_00]: It is so much bigger than you.

[SPEAKER_00]: It will outlast you.

[SPEAKER_00]: It will outlive you.

[SPEAKER_00]: The church was here before you.

[SPEAKER_00]: It was here before me and it'll be here after us and in door till kingdom comes.

[SPEAKER_00]: There is no reason the church should work except the Spirit wills it.

[SPEAKER_00]: Except it is Jesus.

[SPEAKER_00]: It is powered by a living, risen Savior and we get to be part of that.

[SPEAKER_00]: Let's keep going.

[SPEAKER_00]: Ministry of Jesus didn't end it multiplied through his church.

[SPEAKER_00]: But hear me, if we're his body, we cannot ignore his voice.

[SPEAKER_00]: If he's the head, we don't get to move independently.

[SPEAKER_00]: A church that is disconnected from the command of Jesus may have activity, but it will not have authority.

[SPEAKER_00]: Because authority always flows through submission.

[SPEAKER_00]: And power always flows through surrender.

[SPEAKER_00]: In Acts chapter 1 verse 4, she read, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, and being assembled together with them, He commanded them.

Acts 1:4

[SPEAKER_00]: He didn't suggest, he didn't say, if you feel like it, he didn't say pray about it and see what the Father says to you.

[SPEAKER_00]: Jesus commanded them to not depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the promise of the Father.

[SPEAKER_00]: So Jesus makes a command and says, y'all stay here, because before you're gonna get sent to the nation, you're gonna get sent to the upper room.

[SPEAKER_00]: Before Jesus gives them public power, there's a requirement of private obedience.

[SPEAKER_00]: Let me just say that, say this, that is not changed.

[SPEAKER_00]: If we ever want to operate in power publicly, which, first of all, that should never be your pursuit anyways, your pursuit should always be to be obedient to his voice.

[SPEAKER_00]: Right, whenever we pursue obedience, power always comes to the secondary consequence.

[SPEAKER_00]: When we pursue obedience, something happens.

[SPEAKER_00]: The first test of the book of Acts was not our right Peter.

[SPEAKER_00]: Let's see how good your preaching and an oratory skills are.

[SPEAKER_00]: The first test of the book of Acts was can you listen to me and do whatever I say?

[SPEAKER_00]: Can you be obedient to my voice?

[SPEAKER_00]: Could they obey when Jesus told Him to wait?

[SPEAKER_00]: I want you to think about this for a second, because we read that one like, yeah, that'd be easy.

[SPEAKER_00]: It wasn't, you know how we know, it wasn't easy, because he probably said this to 500 people.

[SPEAKER_00]: And how many are in the upper room on the day of Pinnacost?

[SPEAKER_00]: 120.

[SPEAKER_00]: 120.

[SPEAKER_00]: Out of 500, made it to the end.

[SPEAKER_00]: We go, oh, these people saw the ascension.

[SPEAKER_00]: And they still went to take it to the home.

[SPEAKER_00]: I don't know about this.

[SPEAKER_00]: I don't have the time to just go, I don't wanna go back to Jerusalem.

[SPEAKER_00]: That's not where I wanna be.

[SPEAKER_00]: It makes me uncomfortable.

[SPEAKER_00]: Jerusalem is really harsh in my piece right now.

[SPEAKER_00]: I've got a lot of trauma attached to Jerusalem.

[SPEAKER_00]: Right?

[SPEAKER_00]: That's not the appropriate response, but there's some who probably did that because Jerusalem wouldn't have been a traumatic place for them.

[SPEAKER_00]: They just watched Jesus get killed there.

[SPEAKER_00]: There's still threats against them there.

[SPEAKER_00]: Furthermore, they've just seen a resurrected Jesus.

[SPEAKER_00]: They're probably like Jesus.

[SPEAKER_00]: The grave is empty.

[SPEAKER_00]: You've just talked to us the, it is time to strike now.

[SPEAKER_00]: The iron is hot now is the time for we don't need to go wait anymore.

[SPEAKER_00]: This is still fresh in everyone's mice.

[SPEAKER_00]: We have a plan and a strategy that is so much better than yours, Jesus.

[SPEAKER_00]: Go wait in Jerusalem.

[SPEAKER_00]: How long?

[SPEAKER_00]: Until.

[SPEAKER_00]: You ever would be in a kid and you'd ask your parents like, how long like when I say?

[SPEAKER_00]: All right.

[SPEAKER_00]: Now I'm the dad and I get to do that.

[SPEAKER_00]: Feels good.

[SPEAKER_00]: When are we gonna be there?

[SPEAKER_00]: When were there?

[SPEAKER_00]: That's what Jesus is doing.

[SPEAKER_00]: Go Terry, how long until?

[SPEAKER_00]: Just until.

[SPEAKER_00]: How are we gonna know, until you'll know when it happens, you'll get it, you'll understand, they have the right message.

[SPEAKER_00]: They had eyewitness testimony, a 500 people plus.

[SPEAKER_00]: They have an empty tomb, but Jesus still said, wait, why?

[SPEAKER_00]: Because the right message still needs heavens power.

[SPEAKER_00]: The right mission still needs the empowerment of the Spirit.

[SPEAKER_00]: We can have all of the right intentions, but if we don't have the empowerment of the Spirit, it doesn't matter.

[SPEAKER_00]: If he doesn't say, go, it doesn't matter.

[SPEAKER_00]: Sometimes we want God to bless movement that he never commanded.

[SPEAKER_00]: And just because it's the right thing doesn't mean that it's the right time, and it also doesn't mean that it's the God thing.

[SPEAKER_00]: There are some people, like, well, there's nothing wrong with it, but the God say it, did He give the God?

[SPEAKER_00]: Did He get, has the Spirit breathe on this, or we just excited and fired up?

[SPEAKER_00]: Sometimes we want God to empower plans that He never authored to begin with.

[SPEAKER_00]: And sometimes we want God to annoy activity that's been born out of impatience, and He won't do it.

[SPEAKER_00]: Because if there's one thing I know about the Lord,

[SPEAKER_00]: He does not get in a hurry.

[SPEAKER_00]: He said, behold, I come quickly, 2,000 years ago.

[SPEAKER_00]: If you haven't figured it out yet, you are in more of a hurry than he is.

[SPEAKER_00]: You are in, listen, God is, God wants to get it right, not get it done fast.

[SPEAKER_00]: He is more interested in making you

[SPEAKER_00]: And by the way, I'll give you a food analogy.

[SPEAKER_00]: I'll still give you a food analogy because it's what I do.

[SPEAKER_00]: Right?

[SPEAKER_00]: I've been to restaurants before, where you order and the food is like immediately, like, comes out.

[SPEAKER_00]: That's called McDonald's sometimes.

[SPEAKER_00]: Right, people are like, oh, no, McDonald's, I go to.

[SPEAKER_00]: I'll put it to you this way.

[SPEAKER_00]: And the experience at McDonald's, you can go eat in McDonald's, park, get out, go to the counter.

[SPEAKER_00]: If they counter, it still exists.

[SPEAKER_00]: The keyoffs, whatever they have now.

[SPEAKER_00]: Order, get your food, eat your food.

[SPEAKER_00]: Throw away your trash, get your crispy sprite.

[SPEAKER_00]: I don't know what I'm talking about.

[SPEAKER_00]: Come on, y'all gonna look at me that McDonald's has got the crispiest sprite out of it.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's like burns a little bit, praise God.

[SPEAKER_00]: You can do all of that and be at in and out of McDonald's in under 30 minutes without a problem.

[SPEAKER_00]: On a good day, 15 or 20.

[SPEAKER_00]: Depending on how fast you eat.

[SPEAKER_00]: And McDonald's is trash.

[SPEAKER_00]: If I just hurt your feelings, I am so sorry.

[SPEAKER_00]: That junk is awful.

[SPEAKER_00]: The fries hit occasionally.

[SPEAKER_00]: Occasionally, fresh, that's right, fresh.

[SPEAKER_00]: As long as they're salted, just right.

[SPEAKER_00]: But in general, Mickey D's is garbage.

[SPEAKER_00]: And I've told you all this before.

[SPEAKER_00]: I've been blessed over my past from Miranda's marriage.

[SPEAKER_00]: I've been blessed to eat in at least two or three like Michelin star rated restaurants.

[SPEAKER_00]: If you don't know what that is, basically it's like the high one of the highest honors restaurants can receive.

[SPEAKER_00]: We went to the only, at the time, the only two Michelin star restaurant in all of New York City, and let me tell you something.

[SPEAKER_00]: because they're not just making food in the back and letting it sit in the window.

[SPEAKER_00]: They're making everything fresh with the freshest ingredients, with precision.

[SPEAKER_00]: The plating is thought about.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's not just sloped on by a 16 year old who just left high school.

[SPEAKER_00]: These are professional chefs who are practically artists.

[SPEAKER_00]: Right, and whenever these restaurants we go to, it takes two and a half, three, three and a half hours.

[SPEAKER_00]: To eat up Jerry's just shaking his head.

[SPEAKER_00]: He can't believe anybody would even take that long.

[SPEAKER_00]: Takes a long time to have a meal.

[SPEAKER_00]: And between courses, sometimes you can sit there for 20, 30 minutes.

[SPEAKER_00]: Y'all like, oh my god, that sounds awful.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's one of the most exquisite, amazing experiences on the face of the planet.

[SPEAKER_00]: And the quality of that is a whole lot better than McDonald's.

[SPEAKER_00]: So you can have it fast or you can have it right.

[SPEAKER_00]: And here me, if we want a fast work done in our life, you're going to get McDonald's quality most of the time.

[SPEAKER_00]: But if you let the Lord take His time, He is like a fine chef, and it might take a little bit of time.

[SPEAKER_00]: But what He's gonna make is gonna be beautiful, and it's gonna be exquisite, and it's gonna be pleasing, and the time will be worth it to let Him make you.

[SPEAKER_00]: Jesus tells them, wait.

[SPEAKER_00]: He said, stay there.

[SPEAKER_00]: Don't leave.

[SPEAKER_00]: And here, me obedience, often time, doesn't immediately take you into comfort.

[SPEAKER_00]: I would imagine most of them wanted to get out of Jerusalem.

[SPEAKER_00]: And Jesus sends them right back there, because sometimes obedience takes you to the place you want to get out of.

[SPEAKER_00]: Sometimes obedience takes you to a place where you feel vulnerable.

[SPEAKER_00]: Sometimes obedience asks you to trust God even when you don't understand it.

[SPEAKER_00]: Peter once told Jesus,

[SPEAKER_00]: Whenever I say go and Terry, go and wait, are you willing to go and wait?

[SPEAKER_00]: Or are you going to go back to fishing again?

[SPEAKER_00]: What are you going to do?

[SPEAKER_00]: And thankfully, Peter still has that posture of obedience, which is why they can God use his symptom to preach?

[SPEAKER_00]: And to win people, it was because Peter was the best orwriter of the group, it's because Peter was obedient.

[SPEAKER_00]: Sometimes the miracle is simply on the other side of your yes.

[SPEAKER_00]: Sometimes the wind is simply on the other side of your obedience.

[SPEAKER_00]: Sometimes the next move, God is waiting on you to the last thing that Jesus said.

[SPEAKER_00]: Most of the last thing he said in your life, for some of you it's to forgive.

[SPEAKER_00]: You're warning the wind, but you haven't forgiven yet.

[SPEAKER_00]: For some of us, it's to pray again, to repent, to serve, to give, to wait, to go, to make it right, to lay it down, to pick it up.

[SPEAKER_00]: Get back to the altar for all of us it can be different to say yes again, to stop compromising, to get serious about this thing.

[SPEAKER_00]: And I want you hear me obedience because we get in this so confused.

[SPEAKER_00]: Obedience to the voice of Jesus is not legalism.

[SPEAKER_00]: Obedience is love responding to Lordship.

[SPEAKER_00]: Jesus said this, if you love me, do what?

[SPEAKER_00]: Do what?

[SPEAKER_00]: If you love me, keep my commandments.

[SPEAKER_00]: If you love me, do what I say.

[SPEAKER_00]: There's a lot of people who say they love Jesus, but don't do what he says.

[SPEAKER_00]: And we don't get to say we love him.

[SPEAKER_00]: If we don't keep his commandments.

[SPEAKER_00]: If we don't do what he says, I don't want you to hear me.

[SPEAKER_00]: Obedience is not earning it.

[SPEAKER_00]: Obedience is making room for the spirit to move in your life.

[SPEAKER_00]: Philan obedience.

[SPEAKER_00]: Here, man, let's close with this.

[SPEAKER_00]: Come on, Steve, obedience by the apostles turned what was a waiting room into a womb.

[SPEAKER_00]: Acts 1, 12 says that they were turned to Jerusalem as simple but as powerful as his obedience.

[SPEAKER_00]: He told them, don't leave Jerusalem, so they went back to Jerusalem.

[SPEAKER_00]: Jesus told him, wait, so they went to the upper room.

[SPEAKER_00]: Jesus told him,

[SPEAKER_00]: They didn't know what it looked like.

[SPEAKER_00]: They didn't know there was gonna be our mighty rushing win.

[SPEAKER_00]: They didn't know there'll be tongues of fire.

[SPEAKER_00]: They just knew Jesus said this.

[SPEAKER_00]: Wait, just wait, just wait.

[SPEAKER_00]: We want Jesus to tell us where we're going and what's gonna happen before we do anything.

[SPEAKER_00]: And I found more than often he goes, just do what I say and you're gonna figure it out.

[SPEAKER_00]: Just do what I say.

[SPEAKER_00]: There's gonna be worth it.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's easy to obey when God gives you the whole plan and you know the good thing at the end.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's a little more difficult when you don't know where you're going.

[SPEAKER_00]: When all you have is the next action step.

[SPEAKER_00]: And that's once as they just keep being a monochor in prayer and supplication, they continue, they stay, they pray, they come into agreement, they made room.

[SPEAKER_00]: I don't want you to understand whenever we save weight, their weighting is not passive, it's active serving.

[SPEAKER_00]: We hear a waiting as this act of passivity, but it's not a passive act, it's a surrendering act.

[SPEAKER_00]: Because I'm sure they had busy schedules, and I'm sure they had things they would rather be doing.

[SPEAKER_00]: But what they're doing is ain't Jesus, we are surrendering what we want to do so you can do what you want to do.

[SPEAKER_00]: We're surrendering our will so your will can be done.

[SPEAKER_00]: The upper room looks unimpressive.

[SPEAKER_00]: but heaven was forming something there.

[SPEAKER_00]: Acts 2 is the public birthing of the church in power.

[SPEAKER_00]: But Acts 1 is the hidden womb of the church in obedience.

[SPEAKER_00]: That room was more than just a room.

[SPEAKER_00]: It was a womb by which God was able to birth something.

[SPEAKER_00]: And obviously now,

[SPEAKER_00]: 2,000 years later, we have this axe, one account, but to everybody who's around, this just seems spontaneous.

[SPEAKER_00]: All of a sudden, at the feast of Pentecost, there's these men in the streets preaching in the languages of everyone who's there, and it seems like this, whoa, this came out of nowhere, but it didn't come out of nowhere.

[SPEAKER_00]: It came from an upper room that was a womb of obedience.

[SPEAKER_00]: in obedience, the church was birthed, and if it was birthed in obedience, we're going to continue in obedience.

[SPEAKER_00]: We celebrate the fire, but heaven honors the surrender.

[SPEAKER_00]: We celebrate the sermon, but heaven honors the prayers.

[SPEAKER_00]: We celebrate the big public explosion and the preaching and thousands of people getting saved in a day, but heaven honors the private.

[SPEAKER_00]: Yes.

[SPEAKER_00]: Hear me, you may feel like you're in an upper room right now.

[SPEAKER_00]: You may feel like God, I don't know what's going on.

[SPEAKER_00]: I'm just saying, yes, Steve, don't get impatient.

[SPEAKER_00]: Don't throw in the towel.

[SPEAKER_00]: You simply keep saying yes to what he said, in the hidden place, in the secret place, when no one else is around, you are a seed under dirt right now, but something is forming.

[SPEAKER_00]: And something is growing.

[SPEAKER_00]: And don't abort that process.

[SPEAKER_00]: The church was burst, not in power, but in obedience.

[SPEAKER_00]: We say this all the time, it's been a call, so the church was birthed in power, and I'm not saying that's entirely wrong, but I'm saying it started, you know, beatings, it was really born in obedience, because there is no birthing, I don't know, I don't know what this looks like if they're not obedient, God would have found a way, but it looks real different, obedience, what is your yes for me?

[SPEAKER_00]: What is your yes, birthday?

[SPEAKER_00]: This is a greater and bigger thing about this.

[SPEAKER_00]: I'm going to close with this thought.

[SPEAKER_00]: I promise Peter, what he, if he says, if Peter could step into this room right now, he'd probably freak out because he wouldn't know what's going on.

[SPEAKER_00]: Wouldn't know what verse I.

[SPEAKER_00]: All that to say, Peter could have never imagined what started in that upper room, becoming what it is for us right now in this moment.

[SPEAKER_00]: Hear me, what is your private yes right now, birthing?

[SPEAKER_00]: That you may never even see the fullness of the fruit of, but it's going to be something good.

[SPEAKER_00]: Amen.

[SPEAKER_00]: We sound of your feet.

[SPEAKER_00]: Amen.

[SPEAKER_00]: Don't you lose your hands?

[SPEAKER_00]: Father, we thank you for your word.

[SPEAKER_00]: We say yes to you again and again.

[SPEAKER_00]: We've said yes before and we say yes again and again we will be obedient.

[SPEAKER_00]: We will listen to your word and we thank you as we do that you're forming something great in the secret place.

[SPEAKER_00]: You're forming something great that will grow and become greater than we ever hoped thought or imagined.

[SPEAKER_00]: We thank you and we give you praise tonight in Jesus' name and everybody says, Amen.

[SPEAKER_00]: Thanks again for downloading this podcast.

[SPEAKER_00]: We trust that this message has blessed and encouraged and identified you

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[SPEAKER_00]: We'll be back soon with another incredible message.

[SPEAKER_00]: God bless you and have a great week.