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| Do we take the words of Jesus literally? |
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In Acts 1:8 Jesus tells the diciples,"you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be My witnesses both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and even to the remotest part of the earth." The word power in the Greek is Dunamis and it implies miraculous power. Jesus told His disciples that they would recieve this power.... That they to would be able to do miraculous works of God. In fact look what Jesus says in John 14:12, "Truly, truly, I say to you, he who believes in Me, the works that I do, he will do also; and greater {works} than these he will do; because I go to the Father". Jesus says Himself that we would be able to do greater things because he goes to the father which implies that when He goes to the father we get the Holy Spirit and the power of God living inside us. So here is my point.... If we take the words of Jesus literally and really believe that we have this power living inside us.... Shouldn't we be doing greater things? I believe most Christians truly don't believe they have this power... because if they did, it would change the world. In the words of Uncle Ben ( not the rice guy but Spidermans uncle) "with great power comes responsibilities". Think about this for a second.... You have the power of God living inside you... You have the power to change the world for Jesus...... Do you believe it? Christians need to reconize the power God has given us and instead of rejecting culture, we should be reshaping our culture for Jesus. In Microtrends by Mark J. Penn, He writes that because of technology and the shift in culture it would only take 1% of the US population to change the world.... which is roughly 300,000 people. This number is small when you think about the number of people on the internet. On a smaller scale, think about our church. There is about 10,000 people who attend our church. That means 100 people could start a revolution for Jesus. WOW!!!! Think about our city, the World. God didn't give us this power only to do nothing, but to change this world. I challenge you guys that are following Jesus to take His words litterally and make an impact. Where should you start? Fall in love with Jesus and he will lead you, empower you, and use you to be a revolutionary. Vince Sierra |
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"You will not travel through all the cities of judea before you see the son of man coming in his kingdom."
...this statement was directly TO the disciples FOR the disciples. It refers to the escape route if someone was in trouble.
There is no allegory or metaphor in that statement that is for us today ... there are others but my point is some things are literal ,some aren't ,...even the words of Christ. |
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| I should add ,... I was refering only to your initial direct question ,... but the encouragement in your actual blog is not only fantastic but YES!,..for us all |
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Dana |
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October 24, 2007 at 12:36am |
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He who believes in Me...
Do we really believe that he loves us? I think the key to this is understanding that God loves us. Not for what we do, how we look, how we act, but just because we are his children. When we grasp the love then we can let go of the performance which blocks our faith. It's all about the trust. It doesn't matter if you haven't read your Bible...God loves you. I doesn't matter if you skipped out on church a few Sundays...God loves you. I doesn't even matter if you prayed an hour and spoke in tongues for two. God Just Loves You Because You Are You. Grab that and you grab power.
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| I was just getting ready to head to bed and stumbled upon this... man... it's the truth. What part don't we get "Let it be done to you according to your faith" "Faith like a mustard seed" "We can move mountains, if we believe" I agree completely.. how much faith do we have? Does it show by what we are or are not doing in the name of Jesus? Why aren't we healing the sick, making blind men see?? Maybe we get so caught up in the business of church we forget, or can it be that sometimes when we really get a taste of the power of God .... it's kinda scary. Great word Vince... a REVOLUTION. |
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Indeed, we need to take missions quite seriously. And one of the most neglected areas we have is in our own local and European cultures. Christians, by and large, have been stuck in intellectual neutral and have not followed Jesus' example. In fact, just five verses earlier (Acts 1:3) we are told that Jesus "gave many convincing proofs of His resurrection." But the face of today's evangelism centers around "your best life now" and "a better you." How many of us can say that we have given "proofs" of Jesus and the gospel message? Are we willing to continue what Jesus began and bring it to the rest of the world? Then let's get out of neutral and into overdrive with the gospel message! BTW: dunamis in the Greek implies "strength" and/or "power;" there is no connotation of "miraculous" though the spread of Christianity is certainly a miraculous thing! Consider that the very Roman Empire that oppressed Christians (most notably by Nero and Domitian) became a Christian nation in subsequent years. Wow! |
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Vinny |
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October 24, 2007 at 5:57pm |
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| In my keyword it says miraculous... But thats not the point. The point is that we have the power of God living inside of us... Shouldn't that be changing lives including our own? |
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| Dunamis, if you look in the greek dictionary (not the lexicon), specifically means miraculous power. Logically, who would argue otherwise that the work of the Holy Spirit is not miraculous? To say that Acts 1:8 does not imply that the "power" of the the Holy Spirit is miraculous is actually wrong because the word miraculous actually means "of the nature of, suggestion of, or working or able to work miracles". I agree with Vinny, thats not the point anyway. |
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Hello Vince, I read what you wrote and I have to be honest here... I don't like what I read.
I Love What I Read! We ought to be revolutionaries for Christ.... if.. if only people would see Jesus... beyond seeking a saviour for their own personal needs... are you feeeling me?
Pastor Aminata |
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Vinny |
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October 24, 2007 at 9:20pm |
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OH yeah I feel you.... We need to make Jesus Lord of our lives!! Like I said we need to fall in love with Jesus all over again. |
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Vinny, you gave me alot to think about. The responses also gave me alot to think about. I do agree with you. Thanks |
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