Fragrance of The Father Part 4
Script. Joel 2:28-32; Acts 3:33
Introduction:
The pouring out of God’s Spirit on all people was fulfilled at Pentecost. Acts 2:17 says in the last days I will pour out my Spirit on all people. We are living in the last days.
The last day’s consist of When Jesus ascended into heaven and when he comes back again.
God wants to pour out his Spirit on us all if we would only let him, allow him full control.
Perhaps an analogy will best clarify this. As Christians we may be compared with a reservoir for producing electrical power, like one of those you see when you drive down the canyon. When we accept Christ, construction of our reservoir is complete. We now have the potential to be useful and to affect lives. But until the floodgates are opened and the cascading river waters pour through, no power is realized. So it is when we are baptized in the Holy Spirit. We open our lives to God and the Holy Spirit pours into us and through us. It is then we become most effective in God’s service.
As with the reservoir, this power-generating experience is not intended to be a one-time occurrence. It is to be an ongoing process. When our spiritual power runs low, we need to return to the Source and let the blessed Holy Spirit pour into us again, bringing fresh power.
This happened to the early followers of Jesus. Peter and John they had already been baptized in the Spirit (Acts 2); but later on, when persecution arose, they needed a new surge of spiritual power; so they prayed to the Lord once again and "they were all filled with the Holy Spirit" (Acts 4:31).
Contributed by: David Schaal Transitional:
Our faith in God is the key ingredient for having the Holy Spirit’s power and gentle leadings to greater influences for him. Without our faith in God we are useless and unaffected.
I. But Without Faith It Is Impossible To Please Him Heb.11:6:
1. In The Pursuit of God by A. W. Tozer, he has some excellent thoughts in regards to our faith.
2. He basically says, that when we sit down pick up our Bibles for a serious look at God’s word.
3. As If for the first time we pretend that we have had no previous knowledge of God’s word.
4. We are completely without prejudice we have nothing to prove and nothing to defend.
5. We will not have read long until our minds begin to see certain truths standing out from the page.
6. He would see and I quote, “spiritual principles behind the record of God’s dealings with men, and woven into writings of holy men as they “were moved by the Holy Ghost.”
7. If we were to make a clear summary of what we have read one important truth will stand out the importance of our faith.
8. I think today in regards to our having more of God’s presence or being filled with the Spirit in our lives (I really like how Tommy Tenney puts it the fragrance of our father), to be so saturated with His spiritual presence that our lives are changed forever along with the people around us that can’t help but be affected by it..
9. In order for this to happen we cannot miss how important our faith in God really is.
10. Without the presence of God being sprinkled upon our lives will only be just a thought, a theological note in an orchestra of music we do not understand, let alone comprehend.
11. I quote from Tozer, “ Faith is all-important in the life of the soul.
12. Without faith it is impossible to please God Hebrews 11:6.
13. Faith will get me anything, take me anywhere in the kingdom of God, but without faith there can be no approach to God, no forgiveness, no deliverance, no salvation, no communion, no spiritual life at all.
14. Now if faith is so vitally important, if it is an indispensable must in our pursuit of God, it is perfectly natural that we should be deeply concerned whether or not we possess this most precious gift.
15. Skipping down a few paragraphs he says, “faith is believing a promise, taking God at his word, believing the bible to be true and stepping out upon it.”
16. Exercising our faith in someone whose promise has never failed.
17. Having faith in ourselves we will only see our insufficiency, our lack of control, our own hurts and wounds.
18. Looking within us for the answer we will live in the end hopeless empty lives.
19. The Gift: "I was enjoying 1st grade to the fullest until one day in December when the little girl behind me set "it" on her desk. It was the tiniest Christmas present imaginable, less than an inch on each side with white glossy paper tied up with a sliver of red cellophane. Immediately I was captivated. I had never seen anything so exquisite. Day after day the tiny gift caught my eye, and my active imagination tried to guess what miniature treasure might be inside. It had to be something wondrous beyond description.
I longed for that object with all the power a 5-year-old can muster. Finally, I became convinced that it should be mine. I deserved it because I desired it. Since I rode an early bus to school, it was a simple matter to slip into the empty classroom one morning. My hands eagerly tore open the tiny present. Inside I found - nothing.
Staring at the destruction in my hand, anticipation dissolved into disappointment and confusion. Gradually my stunned mind grasped the fact that the little package had been nothing more than a hollow decoration. I sat at my desk with the empty paper and an empty feeling, sickened by the knowledge of my guilt.
Little did I know that morning that this scene would repeat itself many times in my life. As I grew up the world enticed me with all sorts of shiny, gaily wrapped "presents" that caught my eye and promised happiness. Too often, when I accepted what the world was offering and tore away the wrappings, my excited expectations were replaced by feelings of emptiness. Over and over I found myself proving the old cliché: "You can’t judge a gift by its wrapping."
Contributed by: SermonCentral PRO
Transitional: J. I. Packer states the question but is the work of the Holy Spirit really important?
II. The Work of The Holy Spirit:
1. It is very important the church would not be where it is today were it not for the work and power of the Holy Spirit.
2. IN THE CENTER OF CONTROVERSY
In many Christian circles the Holy Spirit is either neglected, forgotten, or misunderstood.
The One given to unite the body of Christ is the center of controversy…
So often Christian work is so rigidly programmed that it seems we need no longer depend on Him--yet Jesus said, "Without Me you can do nothing." ...
The late Dr. A. W. Tozer, author and pastor, said, "If the Holy Spirit was withdrawn from the church today, 95 percent of what we do would go on and no one would know the difference.
If the Holy Spirit had been withdrawn from the New Testament church, 95 percent of what they did would stop, and everybody would know the difference."
SOURCE: The Holy Spirit: Missing, Citation: Alan Redpath in "Christian Life" magazine. Christianity Today, Vol. 29, no. 18. Contributed by: A. Todd Coget
3. The third person in the trinity is the power behind the truth of God without the Holy Spirit there would not be any convicting power, we would still feel guilty for pass sins, and we would still be trying to serve God by works and not by faith.
4. I quote from Knowing God by J. I. Packer, “Important! Why, were it not for the work of the Holy Spirit there would be no gospel, no faith, no church, no Christianity in the world at all.
5. In the first place, without the Holy Spirit there would be no gospel and no New Testament.
6. He continues to say, “ when Christ left the world, he committed his cause to his disciples. He made them responsible for going and making disciples of all the nations.
7. In the upper room Jesus told them…
8. John 15:27
27And you also must testify,
9. Acts 1:8
8But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”
10. These were his parting words before he ascended.
11. Such was their appointed task.
12. J. I. Packer looks back at the disciple’s life while Jesus was with them before the Holy Spirit filled them.
13. I quote: “But what sort of witnesses were they likely to prove?
14. They had never been good pupils; they had consistently failed to understand Christ and missed the point of his teaching throughout his earthly ministry; how could they be expected to do better now that he had gone?
15. Was it not virtually certain that, with the best will in the world, they would soon get the truth of the gospel inextricably mixed up with a mass of well-meant misconceptions, and their witness would rapidly be reduced to a twisted, garbled, hopeless muddle?
16. The answer to this question is no- because Christ sent the Holy Spirit to them, to teach them all truth and so save them from all error, to remind them of what they had been taught already and to reveal to them the rest of what their Lord meant them to learn.”
17. The works of the Holy Spirit took ordinary people who were totally surrendered to God’s will and worked through them to make them powerful reflections of the of what a Christian should be.
18. He took three ordinary fishermen and transformed them into powerful witnesses to God’s truth, Peter, James and John.
19. He took a legalistic follower of the Law of Moses, a killer of Christians and made him into a powerful missionary, Paul.
20. He took a shepherd boy and made him into a prophet King Of Israel, David.
21. He took a young man who was to walk in the shadows in the footsteps of one of the greatest Kings to ever rule over Israel King David, he took a young man who wanted wisdom to be able to rule over them and God made him the wisest man ever to rule, the young man was Solomon.
22. He took a deceptive man and made him into a pillar of strength for God, the man was Jacob.
23. Think of what would happen if you allowed God to have you completely.
24. Just think of where you are now and where he wants you to be a year from now if you will only let him.
Transitional:
For God to have and to fill our hearts completely we must be
III. Being Filled With The Spirit:
1. He wants to take us and do great things through us if only our faith will let him.
2. This is a reality of the Christian experience.
3. We all must tarry alone with God to be filled with the power Holy Spirit of God.
4. To be empowered to live rightly by the God of heaven.
5. To be empowered by, to be filled with the Holy Spirit God must have the steering wheel of our lives to take us where he wants to.
6. To experience him in such a real supernatural way.
7. To feel his presence as Moses did at the burning bush.
8. Jacob sleeping on a rock seeing the stairway of heaven.
9. To be high priest in the holy of holies having God’s glory fill the temple.
10. To be in the upper room at Pentecost where the Spirit came as a rushing mighty wind.
11. We must have the faith to believe that God knows what he is doing, to completely rest in his arms and feel secure.
12. D. L. Moody said, “I believe firmly that the moment our hearts are emptied of pride and selfishness and ambition and everything that is contrary to God’s law, the Holy Spirit will fill every corner of our hearts.
But if we are full of pride and conceit and ambition and the world, there is no room for the Spirit of God. We must be emptied before we can be filled.”
13. God needs an empty vessel to fill.
14. We were corrupt the day we were born so far from God.
15. So we need to empty ourselves from our ideas and philosophy of living that we have learn so far.
16. We are in error; our ideas are full of faults and endless running around in circles to find truth.
17. When we know through God’s word that he is the way, the truth and the life.
18. He has all the answers.
19. We need to empty ourselves, empty our minds and heart, to let the Holy Spirit of God fill us in order to find the ways the truths of God and to ever lasting fulfillment.
20. Car that Wouldn’t Start
In a seminary mission’s class, Herbert Jackson told how, as a new missionary, he was assigned a car that would not start without a push. After pondering his problem, he devised a plan. He went to the school near his home, got permission to take some children out of class, and had them push his car off. As he made his rounds, he could either park on a hill or leave the engine running. He used this ingenious procedure for two years. Ill health forced the Jackson family to leave, and a new missionary came to that station.
When Jackson proudly began to explain his arrangement for getting the car started, the new man began looking under the hood. Before the explanation was complete, the new missionary interrupted, “Why, Dr. Jackson, I believe the only trouble is this loose cable.” He gave the cable a twist, stepped into the car, pushed the switch, and to Jackson’s astonishment, the engine roared to life.
For two years needless trouble had become routine. The power was there all the time. Only a loose connection kept Jackson from putting that power to work.
J. B. Phillips paraphrases Ephesians l:19-20, “How tremendous is the power available to us who believe in God.” When we make firm our connection with God, his life and power flow through us. Ernest B. Beevers
21. The reason our Christian walk with God is powerless in the world of evil is because of us, ourselves hold him back from working through us.
22. The power is there all the time, ready for us to harness it, to use it for the Glory of God.
Transitional:
Like it or not in order to have this power with God is through a life of surrender.
Conclusion:
A Surrendered Life To The Holy Spirit:
1. Enabled the early Christians in the face of extreme opposition to take their stand for Jesus.
2. Jonathan White sings, “Street Preacher”
3. In Acts 4:8 Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, said to them…
4. It was God’s Spirit that enabled Peter to take a stand and witness before the captain of the temple guard and the Sadducees.
5. Peter who earlier prior to Pentecost would of pulled out a sword or said something without thinking about it; spoke this time with clarity and with power.
6. Peter and John went to the temple seeing a man that was crippled from birth touched him in the name of Jesus and the man was heal by the Holy Spirit that was within them.
7. Missionary Amy Carmichael offered a wise prayer: “Holy Spirit—think through me, till Your ideas are my ideas.”
8. Let this be our prayer from day to day, only in the center of God’s will we will find peace.
9. JUST HANG ON TIGHT
A. J. Gordon, one of the founders of Gordon Conwell Divinity School, told of being out walking and looking across a field at a house. There beside the house was what looked like a man pumping furiously at on of those hand pumps. As Gordon watched, the man continued to pump at a tremendous rate; he seemed absolutely tireless, pumping on and on, up and down, without ever slowing in the slightest, much less stopping.
Truly it was a remarkable sight, so Gordon started to walk toward it. As he got closer, he could see it was not a man at the pump, but a wooden figure painted to look like a man. The arm that was pumping so rapidly was hinged at the elbow and the hand was wired to the pump handle The water was pouring forth, but not because the figure was pumping it. You see, it was an artesian well, and the water was pumping the man!
When you see a man who is at work for God and producing results, recognize that it is the Holy Spirit working through him, not the man’s efforts that are giving results. All he has to do—and all you have to do is keep your hand on the handle.
SOURCE: Ted Sunderland in "Constantly Abiding" on www.sermoncentral.com
