Gifted

Acts 1:6 Therefore, when they had come together, they asked Him, saying, "Lord, will You at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?" 7 And He said to them, "It is not for you to know times or seasons which the Father has put in His own authority. 8 But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be witnesses to Me in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth." 9 Now when He had spoken these things, while they watched, He was taken up, and a cloud received Him out of their sight. 10 And while they looked steadfastly toward heaven as He went up, behold, two men stood by them in white apparel, 11 who also said, "Men of Galilee, why do you stand gazing up into heaven? This same Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will so come in like manner as you saw Him go into heaven."

Sometimes when we don’t get exactly what we want it leads to disabling disappointment. Jesus was planning for something else in the lives of His disciples.

They asked a reasonable question based on His presence in a resurrected body, and by His teaching that He had come to bring the kingdom of heaven to the earth. “Lord, is it time? Will we now be princes and rulers and such over all the earth?”

Jesus response was immediately off-putting and mind-changing at once. “It is not for you to know!”

But wait, there’s more! And rather than disabling disappointment, Jesus points to an enabling power, even explosive power. Rather than focusing on this world and your power in it, Jesus tells His disciples, (and us,) that He wants them and us to be focused on the next world and power from it.

‘Dunamis’ or “dynamite” power from heaven on earth, that we may be witnesses – or martyrs for Christ.

And we will need to be because in the next moment Christ ascended from earth to heaven and left His disciples, but not only His disciples to complete the work. And this is what He told them to wait for: Another Helper. Another helper just like Him, just like Jesus. A Helper who would work from the inside out rather than from the outside in. This would be the Holy Spirit. The Promise of the Father. The Spirit of Almighty God living in each human heart who would receive Him.

And this is what produces a witness who has seen the Lord, even in those who have not seen Jesus with the physical eye. Of all those re-born of repentance there is an inherent incumbent gift which is received, and it is the gift to see God with the eyes of the heart, and this gift is commendable and communicable. This is why Jesus has said we are to go into the whole world to share it.

- Pastor Bill