I grew up in a home where both my parents smoked. You know how it is when you grow up in it, you get used to the smell and don’t even recognize it. I never really recognized it until Laura and I were married and moved away from home. We didn’t smoke, so when we would go over to the house to visit, and then come back to our apartment, everything smelled terrible. Mom would send home food and I can remember a cake which smelled like a cigarette when we set it on the table…tasted like one too. This is not a message on smoking. I am using this illustration to say, you can tell when I have spent time with my father, you can recognize it because I smell like smoke after a visit. I cannot hide the fact I have been with him. And the same is true when you have been with Jesus.
It is costly to follow Jesus. There is a real danger for Christians that we can come into this building and begin to feel real comfortable, and get inspired being around others who know Jesus. It is a safe thing here…we can talk about the Lord, share testimonies of what God is doing in our lives, sing and shout and get excited about the things of God. But it becomes controversial as soon as we walk outside the doors and step onto the streets of Seattle. Do you know what I am talking about? It is not a modern problem, it has been a problem from ancient times. Peter and John discovered the controversy in Acts 4. They had been taking the message of Jesus and the story of the resurrection from the safety of the Upper Room and the huddle of homes were people agreed and believed the same things, out onto the streets of the city. The result was they were arrested and put in jail. They found themselves threatened and harassed by people who did not see things in the same way they did. But there was an undeniable fact about these followers of Jesus that everyone recognized. Look in your notes, Acts 4:13…
Now, when they saw the boldness of Peter and John, and perceived that they were uneducated, common men, they wondered; and they recognized that they had been with Jesus.
When the people witnessed the courage of Peter and John, when they realized these were just two uneducated, ordinary men, they were amazed and they smelled the smoke and they recognized that they had been with Jesus. When you are around someone long enough, you take on their mannerism, you begin to talk like them, act like them, smell like them. And everyone else will recognize it. Have you ever noticed how some ministers are like other ministers in their walk, talk and mannerism? They have taken on the smell of their mentors. And we recognize it. You can smell the smoke lit from the fire. I want to talk to you tonight of the smoke and the fire that is going to spread forth from Ballard Assembly and touch the world for Christ, beginning right here in Seattle, it is time for us to start…
I. Coming Out of the Closet I want to relate with out times with this…
A. A Modern Day Story
Coming out of the closet has been the theme of television and movies in our recent past. Most of us are probably aware of the much publicized Ellen DeGeneres coming out on her now canceled television program. When the producers of the television show Rosanne were writing their final episode ending an almost decade run of the program, they wanted to do something that would rival the shock value of Ellen coming out of the closet. When DeGeneres did her show, she drew a 40% market share the night of her coming out. So the producers thought, what can we do that will grab and shock the publics attention. Do you know what they had Rosanne do? They had her pray. They said that prayer to the American public is as equally shocking as what Ellen did. And can I say this folks, if this is the truth, than somehow Christians have gone deeply into the closet. Lets look at the…
B. Costs and Risks of Coming Out
It is costly to come out of the closet. It is risky. When you expose yourself for what you really are and what you believe it eliminates a lot of other possibilities. I don’t think you are ever going to see Ellen DeGeneres playing the leading lady’s role next to George Clooney in some kind of a movie. When you risk coming out of the closet, it eliminates a lot of other possibilities.
Now I have a question. Here is Peter, who has crossed the threshold of his comfort zone. Remember earlier he had denied Christ and fled when Jesus was arrested. He ran deep into the closet when someone asked if he had been associated with Jesus. Three times he denied Jesus, but here, three months later, threatened, arrested and imprisoned. What made the difference? Acts 4:8 Then Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, said to them, “Rulers of the people and elders,”
II. The Difference: Filled with the Spirit. And what a difference it makes. Lets take a closer look at the components that made this difference and see how they might do the same for us.
A. Fire.
Acts 4:8 said Then Peter filled with the Holy Spirit. Do you see that, Peter was filled with the Holy Spirit. There are a lot of people in the church who have the Holy Spirit, but I don’t think we could honestly say they are filled with the Holy Spirit. There is a great image the Bible uses for being filled with the Holy Spirit, or being filled with the presence of God, and that is FIRE. It is a great image. Remember the Upper Room when the Holy Spirit came down, and it looked as if fire was resting on their heads. Anywhere God is, often we find the symbol in the Scriptures of fire. When you are near a fire, you smell smoke, right? You can’t fake it.
When you are around a fire, people smell smoke. It seems around a campfire the smoke follows everyone who is standing there, permeating their clothes. When you are around the presence of God, people around you will be able to smell the smell of God. You can’t fake that either. They smell the smell of smoke. Now a lot of us supper what from I call the “smell of the bottle,” mentality.
Did you know you can buy fake scents. They had basketball players wearing pads under their arm pits so they could extract the scent of that player and put it in a bottle so you could smell like Mike too. I don’t think that one went too well. If you put up an artificial Christmas tree, you can buy evergreen scent to spray on the tree so it will smell like the real forest. And we buy glade mist to spray around the house when someone comes over or plug it in, plug it in.
All of these are basically smells of the bottle. You don’t have to get the real thing. We set these containers on the back of the toilet that smell like roses, but who are we kidding? I never say to Laura, Honey, it smells like you have been arranging roses in the bathroom today. It is all just smells in the bottle. They even have this stuff you can put in your car that will give you the smell of a new car. Now you can buy a used car that smells like a new car. Has anyone here tried it out?
Occasionally I like to get my Ronco food dehydrator out and make beef jerky. The recipe calls for Liquid Smoke. It gives the meat the flavor of smoke, so I soak the meat in fake smoke, smell in a bottle, before I dehydrate it.
Something they have not come out with is God in a bottle. Amen. When you get around a real fire, there is real smoke. You can’t fake it. If you are in the midst of the presence of God, you have to be hot. There is nothing lukewarm about being in the presence of God. You can’t be in the middle, riding the fence when you come into His presence. You will be recognized because you will smell the smoke.
In fact, being lukewarm ticks Jesus off. He said you are neither hot or cold, it would have been better off for you if you would have been one or the other because being lukewarm makes me sick.
Everyone you read about in the Bible who was in the midst of the presence of God was on fire. They were all hot. They were all recognized. You could not hide out if you were in God’s presence.
There is a good example of being in the presence of someone in 2 Kings 13:21 And as they were burying a man, behold they saw a marauding band; and they cast the man into the grave of Elisha. And when the man touched the bones of Elisha he revived and stood up on his feet.
This is a great story. Elisha’s life had been so hot for God that it still had not cooled off in the grave. He was so hot that when a dead man’s bones touched his, the dead man could not stay dead. When you are bringing with the presence of God in your life, even when you are dead, your life will touch people for years to come. But it takes…
B. Courage.
You need to recognize the fact, people are going to smell the smoke of Jesus on you. I like what it said of Peter and John, the people were amazed by their courage. Do you know what courage is? Courage is a passionate commitment to God’s truth. If you are filled with the spirit of God you have a passionate commitment to God’s truth.
Sadly, truth is not an in thing in America today. Truth is out and tolerance is in. That is why the church has become unpopular and if you are committed to truth, you are nor going to be popular. In fact, it could get you into trouble. You are going to be recognized and people are going to smell the smoke of Jesus on you.
What is in today is being spiritual, what is out is being specific about your spirituality. You can be as spiritual as you want, just as long as you don’t name names. Don’t say Jesus…just say God, or the cosmos. Spiritual is in, specifics are out. We can say how things have gone downhill over the years, but it was no different in biblical times when Peter and John lived. The people were upset then, just as they are upset today. Lets look at some verses in Acts 4. In your notes…
And as they were speaking to the people, the priests and the captain of the temple and the Sadducees came upon them, annoyed because they were teaching the people and proclaiming in Jesus the resurrection from the dead…So they called them and charged them not to speak or teach in the name of Jesus. (vs. 1-2, 18)
What made these people so nervous? It was because the followers of Jesus were courageously passionate about truth and specific truth. While Peter and John were speaking to the people, the authorities came because they were teaching that Jesus was resurrected from the grace. If you start out with a truth such as that, it is controversial. Verse 18 demonstrates that you can be spiritual but no specific for they were told not to talk about Jesus. Be tolerant, but don’t get too much into truth. Speak, but don’t speak in the name of Jesus. There is a
C. Cost for Coming Out. The same rules that applied then, apply to us today. It makes people nervous when you articulate what you believe. Opposition may be more civilized, persecution more subtle, but it does cost to be faithful. Church, it is time to walk up from your summer slumber. To come out come out from wherever you are. There is no such thing as fake smoke where most of the church people hang. It cost something to be faithful. They said in Acts 4:19-20 But Peter and John answered them, “Whether it is right in the sight of God to listen to you rather than to God, you must judge; for we cannot but speak of what we have seen and heard.
They told the leaders, they would not be stopped from speaking what they had seen and heard. You know what it means to be courageous? It means to be passionate about God’s truth. You are going to be recognized. People are going to smell the smoke and you are going to be dangerous because you can’t keep these people in the closet. They want to be a witness for Christ. Do you know what it means to be a witness? It means to have a passionate commitment to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help me God. Isn’t that right? Isn’t that what it means to be a witness? I cannot help but tell you what I have seen. How can you shut up about Jesus and what He is doing in your life and the lives of others?
A young girl had come home from college during the summer break and said to her dad, “You know, sometimes we go through the periods in our lives where we kind of struggle and sometimes its hard to be a Christian because Christians are so judgmental and mean.” Her father responded, “I know. Christians are some of the meanest people I know. They are. I understand what you mean. Listen to me. We do not do what we do because of Christians. Do you know what Gandhi, the leader of the revolution in India said? ‘I would have become a Christian, but I didn’t because of you Christians, because you are so unlike your Christ.’ This father went on to say, “I don’t know if your mom and dad would still be married…I probably wouldn’t even have lived with you growing up, if Jesus Christ hadn’t risen from the grace and radically changed my life.”
The difference between the dad and some others is that he fell in the fire and was consumed by the flame, and he walked out with the smell of Jesus on him, not just a label he wears on his clothes. It costs something to follow Jesus Christ, if you are going to follow Him, you are going to be living on the edge. There is no middle place here. If you are following Jesus you are always going to be in a little bit of trouble with the politically correct in our society.
I have noticed this about the followers of Jesus, maybe you have too. Those who were serious about their faith were always in trouble because they annoyed people. Serious followers of Jesus make people feel uncomfortable because of this passionate commitment they have to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth so help me God. You are always going to be on the edge, but folks, let me tell you, the edge is the only place that is worth living, because it is on the edge that you can feel the earth move and the ground shake.
Chapter four is a great chapter, take a good look at it this week. Peter and John are threatened. You can beat these people, you can threaten these people, you can call them names, lock them up in jail, but you cannot shut them up. So they let Peter and John go after they took a little more time to harass them. So they leave the jail and head back to their home group meeting, where there home group prays, and they share with their home group that they have been harassed and threatened. Look at what is says in verse 29, 30 And now, Lord, look upon their threats, and grant to thy servants to speak thy word with all boldness while thou stretchest out thy hand to heal, and signs and wonders are performed through the name of thy holy servant Jesus. Basically, Dear God, you heard the murderous threats against us, what they will do to us.
How would we pray this today? ‘Oh Lord, help me. Don’t let anything happen to us. Keep us safe in this closet.’ Isn’t that how we pray, help me! Save me! While in Acts they were saying, don’t worry about us, God. In a more modern translation, Just keep on keeping on, don’t worry about what they do to us. Just use us and use us to demonstrate your truth and purpose in the world. I like that, don’t worry about us God, don’t worry about the threats, what is important is that your truth is demonstrated through all the earth.
Lets look at the results of that kind of praying.. Acts 4:31 And when they had prayed, the place in which they were gathered was shaken, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke the word of God with boldness. They had prayed, not Oh Lord, keep us safe so we don’t lose our jobs. That is a concern of people today. I am not talking about being obnoxious in sharing your faith, we have to be stewards of our employers time, but some people are afraid to say anything because they fear they will be fired, while all around them people share the philosophies of this present age and we as Christians let it by uncontested. In the Bible they prayed, God, don’t worry about our jobs, don’t listen to the treats, help us to keep on keeping on. When you begin to pray that kind of prayer, watch out, things are going to be shaken for the glory of His kingdom’
The edge is the only place to live because it is at the edge that you feel the earth move. And they were filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke the word of God with boldness.
Recognize, you smell the smoke, Church, wake up from your summer slumber. Come out, come out from wherever you are! You cannot stay in the middle when you have been in the presence of Jesus who has come from the grave, compromise is not an option. Why? Because when you get into the fire you are going to smell like smoke. The edge is the only place to live because it is at the edge that you feel the earth move.
I want to ask you to take a moment right now and pray with me in such a way that you are listening to God’s voice, not mine. You can stand, sit or kneel, just come to a position where you are open to the Spirit of God.
The edge is the only place to live because it is at the edge that you can feel the earth move and the ground shake. For Peter, what was the difference from three months earlier…Then Peter was deep in the closet, but three months later he was out. The difference was that Peter had become filled with the Spirit of God. Do you know what it means to be filled with the Spirit? It means all of God and none of me. He edge is the only place to live because it is at the edge where you can feel the earth move and the ground shake.
Prayer this prayer with me…
Lord Jesus, fill me with your Holy Spirit. I am not my own. I am yours. For you created me and brought me back. Fill me with your Holy Spirit.
The edge is the only place to live because it is at the edge where you feel the earth move and the ground shake. Lord, I love what John the Baptist said, He must increase and I must decrease. That is what is means to be filled with the Holy Spirit. Lord, you must increase, and I must decrease. This is not about fake smoke or God in a bottle. This is about being totally surrendered and yielding to the presence of God. Lord Jesus, do not worry about us, but use us that your presence and purpose may be felt all throughout the world.
In Jesus name I pray…Amen
Alter time
