Scripture Acts 16:5-10
“Where is Jesus?” is what we asked
last week. The answer is that Jesus is seated at the right hand of God the
Father in heaven. Jesus has sent to us His Spirit in place of his physical
presence – that is: His Holy Spirit.
The HS is important to Jesus!
Matt 12:31-32
And so I tell you, every sin and blasphemy will
be forgiven men, but the blasphemy against the Spirit will not be forgiven.
32 Anyone who speaks a word against the Son of
Man will be forgiven, but anyone who speaks against the Holy Spirit will not
be forgiven, either in this age or in the age to come. A sense of Familia Protectiveness
Blas = injur
--- Pheme = words / to speak against
The Holy Spirit is almost never seen more active than in a
few obscure verses in Acts 16:5-10
SLIDE:
MAP
So the churches were strengthened in the faith and grew daily in
numbers. 6 Paul and his companions traveled throughout the region of Phrygia and
Galatia, having been kept by the Holy Spirit
from preaching the word in the province of Asia. 7 When they came to the
border of Mysia, they tried to enter Bithynia,
but the Spirit of Jesus would not allow them to. 8 So they passed by Mysia
and went down to Troas. 9 During the night Paul had a vision of a
man of Macedonia standing and begging him, "Come over to Macedonia and
help us." 10 After Paul had seen the vision, we got
ready at once to leave for Macedonia, concluding that God had called us to
preach the gospel to them.
Swimming the English Channel
It was a fog-shrouded morning, July 4, 1952, when a young
woman named Florence Chadwick
SLIDE
flo 1 waded into the water off Catalina Island. She intended to swim the
channel from the island to the California coast. Long-distance swimming was not
new to her; SLIDE Flo 2
she had been the first woman to swim the English Channel in both directions.
The water was numbing cold that day. The fog was so thick
she could hardly see the boats in her party. Several times sharks had to be
driven away with rifle fire. She swam more than 15 hours before she asked to be
taken out of the water. Her trainer tried to encourage her to swim on since
they were so close to land, but when Florence looked, SLIDE Flow 3 all she saw was fog. So she
quit. . . only one-mile from her goal.
Later she said, “I’m not excusing myself, but if I could
have seen the land I might have made it.” It wasn’t the cold or fear or
exhaustion that caused Florence Chadwick to fail. It was the fog.
Many times we too fail, not because we’re afraid or because
of the peer pressure or because of anything other than the fact that we lose
sight of the goal. Maybe that’s why Paul said, “I press toward the mark for the
prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus” (Phil. 3:14).
Two months after her failure, SLIDE Flo 4 Florence Chadwick walked off the same
beach into the same channel and swam the distance, setting a new speed record,
because she could see the land.
The Fog Lifted
It
was June 18, 1815, the Battle of Waterloo. The French under the command of Napoleon
were fighting the Allies (British, Dutch, and Germans) under the command of
Wellington. The people of England depended on a system of semaphore signals to
find out how the battle was going. One of these signal stations was on the
tower of Winchester Cathedral.
Lat
in the day it flashed the signal: “W-E-L-L-I-N-G-T-O-N- - -D-E-F-E-A-T-E-D- -.”
Just at that moment one of those sudden English fog clouds made it impossible
to read the message. The news of defeat quickly spread throughout the city. The
whole countryside was sad and gloomy when they heard the news that their
country had lost the war. Suddenly the fog lifted, and the remainder of the
message could be read. The message had four words, not two. The complete
message was: “W-E-L-L-I-N-G-T-O-N- - -D-E-F-E-A-T-E-D- - -T-H-E- - -E-N-E-M-Y!”
It took only a few minutes for the good news to spread. Sorrow was turned into
joy, defeat was turned into victory!
So
it was when Jesus was laid in the tomb on the first Good Friday afternoon. Hope
had died even in the hearts of Jesus’ most loyal friends. After the frightful
crucifixion, the fog of disappointment and misunderstanding had crept in on the
friends of Jesus. They had “read” only part of the divine message. “Christ
defeated” was all that they knew. But then on the third day – Easter Sunday –
the fog of disappointment and misunderstanding lifted, and the world received
the complete message: “Christ defeated death!” Defeat was turned into victory;
death was turned to life!
Sin blocks the Spirit
Gifts of the Spirit
Fruit of the Spirit
Acts 2:42
STORY: The Butterfly Story
Part way thru story talking about butterfly on leg SLIDE btf
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