The Call to All

I want you to think, for just a moment, that the One who created all that there is has an agenda for this planet. The Creator. The One who spoke and the cosmos came into existence. The Alpha and the Omega. The One who’s all-knowing. All-powerful. He has an agenda for all things and He has an agenda for all people.

To understand that agenda on our part we have to go back to, literally, the dawn of creation. Beyond the great cosmos to this one privileged planet. And scientists know what I’m talking about.

The unique situation in which the earth orbits and where it’s at in this galaxy. And then on this one small planet, the pinnacle of God’s creation, mankind, ignited the greatest love story ever.

In fact, as you open the Bible, you find that in Genesis chapters 1 and 2 and then later at the very end, chapters 21 and 22 of Revelation, we have the picture of God’s great love story.

So often, so much of life and so much of what it means to follow God or hearing about Christ has fallen into religious ears instead of: it’s a love story. God lived in perfect harmony, in relationship with the Godhead, self-existent, transcendent, in need of nothing, and in need of no one. But chose to create free, moral beings in His image, placed them in a perfect environment.

And in Genesis 1 and 2, we get the picture of knowing and being known. The God, the Creator with the pinnacle of His creation, Adam and Eve, loving and being loved.

And then the course of the time the greatest divorce that has ever occurred in all of the universe, occurred.

In a moment of weakness and temptation our first parents decided that they wanted to be like God. That they wanted to do their own thing. And so, something happened. It literally, it says that there was a fall. Sin entered the world. And the actual creation even groans to this day.

And the explanation for hurricanes and earthquakes and things that the world was never supposed to happen happened when sin entered the world.

God in His great, great mercy killed an animal and clothed our first parents and covered their shame and their nakedness. And then He set them outside of this perfect environment because the tree of life was in it. And if they would eat of it they would stay in this fallen state forever and ever and ever.

And what you need to understand is there’s a perfect environment in chapters 1 and 2 of Genesis and there is a day that will come when the Creator of all of life, with whosoever would trust and believe in the gift of Christ, will live in a perfect environment called the kingdom of God, a new heaven and a new earth.

But all of Scripture, from chapter 3 verse 21 all the way through to chapter 20 of Revelation is the great tsunami of God’s grace.

It’s the movement of God. You know, we’ve seen the pictures like you see. If you’re in one of those buildings and that tsunami wall is coming, it’s unstoppable. Unstoppable destruction. And we’ve seen it happen recently.

What I want you to get in your mind is that from the very first moment when God clothed our parents, He began this unstoppable wave of grace, this grace that wanted to redeem. This grace that wanted to reconcile. This grace that wanted to forgive and atone for.

And so you’ll actually see on your notes, I put a little chart where you can see where that Old Testament begins. And so He chooses an Abraham and the Abraham and there’s a story. And then there’s a Law with Moses. And in the Law we get all the inklings about sacrifices and redemption.

And then the Ten Commandments come and then there’s this nation of Israel and the goal is this nation would be this pinnacle and draw all the world as they would see the greatness of our God. Until we get to the cross.

And all the prophets in all the time with the story of Israel because God promised. He promised from the very first time in Genesis 3 through multiple prophets in multiple times that one day, a Messiah, a Savior, a Deliverer would come.

And that the tsunami of grace would be clear and vivid. And that God would live among us and He would love us and His life would demonstrate the Father’s heart full of truth and grace. And then His death would actually pay for, once and for all, the sins of all people of all time.

And that tsunami of grace was offered to the nation of Israel and they rejected their own Messiah. And Jesus died and then He rose three days later and having paid for all sin of all men of all time and conquering death and conquering Satan, He starts a new wave of grace called the Church, a supernatural community where the living Christ who walked on the earth in His physical body would now, God, the Holy Spirit would come, and live inside His followers who trust Him.

And that tsunami wall of grace would rise higher and higher and forcefully move and Jesus would say the gates of hell could not and will not prevail against His church. And we’re His Church.

The founder of the Church is Jesus and Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John are the story of our founder Jesus. And the book of Acts is a story of His followers, of what happened after He left and empowered them and this tsunami wave of grace moving forward.

And if you’ll open your Bibles to Acts chapter 1, we’re going to go on a journey together. And on this journey together, we’re going to watch and discover: what did God do? How does this grace push forward? How does it move with just unstoppable force century after century after century?

Because if you do not understand what God was doing in that early Church, you’ll never understand His agenda for your life.

If you can’t get that the eternal God of the universe has a plan and it’s not just a plan for the planet, it’s a plan for every person on the planet of which you are one. And those of you who call Christ your Lord and you’re following Him, you’ve got to understand this was the game plan for the first century Church because it informs His game plan for the twenty-first century Church.

The first century Church, what was God’s agenda then? And what you’re going to learn in the first five verses is that His followers are given the task to finish what He began to do and to teach.

The end of Luke, the author is Luke, he’s a doctor. He’s a researcher. Luke and Acts are almost like a documentary. And he does all the research and he’s writing, many people believe, to a person of great influence, Theophilus.

And at the very end of Luke, chapter 24, Jesus opens the mind of His disciples to understand the Scriptures and then He gives them this assignment. He says, “This message of the Kingdom of God of repentance will be preached through every nation on the earth and I will empower you and you’ll be My messengers. You’ll be the unstoppable tsunami force of My grace and love to go to all the earth and let them know there’s hope, there’s deliverance in Me.”

And then, in Acts, he continues his documentary. And we pick it up and he says, “In my former account, Theophilus, I wrote of all that Jesus began to do and to teach until the day He was taken up to heaven. And after giving instructions through the Holy Spirit to the apostles He had chosen, after His suffering,” speaking of the cross, “He showed Himself to these men and gave many convincing proofs.”

That word, literally, in Greek is a “sure sign.” This is the idea of supernatural, miraculous things that they experienced. It was Thomas touching the holes in His hand. It was Him walking through a wall. It was multiple things so they knew, over forty days, the New Testament has ten specific occurrences, that in a resurrected body, He comes to His disciples and lets them know, this is real. “I really rose from the dead.” It wasn’t one person here or one person there.

And then He did some teaching. He says that convincing proofs that He was alive and then He appeared to them for over forty days and spoke about the kingdom of God.

And all that means is the rule of God. This is how life works when God is in control. I’m going to send you to finish what I began. And He’s giving them instruction and He’s opening their mind to the Old Testament and giving them a picture of what’s going to happen and what their role is in it.

One on occasion, while He was eating with them, He gave them this command: “Do not leave Jerusalem but wait for the gift my Father promised, which you have heard Me speak about. For John baptized you with water but in a few days, you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit.

And in your Bible you might circle that phrase “Holy Spirit.” In the book of Acts, it occurs seventy different times. The second person of the Godhead is going to take up personal residence inside the human bodies of His followers and they’re going to live the way Jesus lived when He walked on the earth.

They will feel and care for those the way Jesus cared and felt for those when He walked on the earth. They’re going to finish what Jesus began.

Now, if you were a Jew at this time and you were well schooled, as these men were, and He talked about the Holy Spirit and the Kingdom of God, your mind would drift back to Ezekiel chapter 36.

The Holy Spirit was not a new concept for Old Testament saints. And you would think because Ezekiel talks about the coming of the spirit and the restoration of the kingdom and God promises in Ezekiel 36, there’s coming a day when the kingdom’s going to be restored, Israel’s going to be restored, there is going to be peace, the crops are going to be great, Israel as you knew it in the old days is going to happen and it’s going to be wonderful.

And they thought, “Maybe this is the time.” So look at verse 6. Notice the question the apostles ask. “So, when they met together, they asked Him.” And the tense of this verb, literally, is they were continually asking Him until they got an answer.

“Lord, are you at this time going to restore the kingdom to Israel?” He said to them, “It’s not for you to know the times or the dates the Father has set by His own authority. But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you and you will be My witnesses.”

And then He tells them, sort of, the game plan. It’s the outline of the book. “You’ll be My witnesses.” Literally, the word, we get our word “martyr.” “You’ll be My martyr, you’ll be My eye witnesses. You’re the ones that have seen. You’re the ones that have heard. You’re going to experience My power. And you’re going to be My witnesses in Jerusalem the city, Judea the area, Samaria the area beyond that, and to the uttermost parts of the earth.”

And so what you see is God’s agenda, first and foremost, is He says to His followers, “You finish what I began.” And then second, He says their focus was to fulfill the global agenda. Not their national political interests.

See, when they heard about the Holy Spirit, they’re a lot like us. They thought, “Oh great! You’re going to take down Rome, these cultural wars are going to be over, the religious wars are going to be over.”

I mean, this was a wicked time of life. I mean, this was a polluted time filled with corruption and filled with all kind of idolatry. And so they were thinking, “Great, Jesus has come, He’s the King, He’s risen from the dead, He’s the man, we’re going to sit on the thrones, let’s go for it.”

And He goes, “No.” You see, there’s this parenthesis. Everything that God promised to Abraham and David will be fulfilled but this parenthesis, this is the time of the Church. The supernatural agency of blessing of God’s purposes on the earth will be the Church and it’s a new thing.

Paul describes it and explains it in chapters 1, 2, and 3 of the book of Ephesians. And He says, “Guys, stop thinking about your political interests and your national interest and what you want done for you and your protection and your comfort.”

He says, “There’s a global agenda. You’re to be My witnesses where you are, next to where you are, extended from where you are, and to the uttermost parts of the earth.”

Well, as He does that then He gives them some assurance. Because I don’t know about you but if you got that word from Jesus at that point in time with your worldview, A) it would be a little disappointing and 2) it would be impossible. Like, are you kidding me?

I mean Peter’s pretty forthright. I can see him, “Hey, John, there’s a hundred and twenty of us. Is He joking? I mean, He may come through the wall and give us some assurance or something again but, I mean, a hundred and twenty of us. We’re going to go to the ends of the earth?”

So the third part of His agenda He makes very clear. He says their assurance of success was the indwelling Holy Spirit and the certainty of Jesus’ return.

What He wants them to know in this very first launch of the Church and this tsunami wave of grace is you can’t do it.

And so we pick up the story in verse 9. “After He said this He was taken up before their eyes and a cloud hid Him from their sight. And they were looking intently up into the sky as He was going when suddenly two men dressed in white stood beside them.” Two angels show up.

“Men of Galilee,” they said, “why do you stand here looking into the sky? This same Jesus who has been taken from you into heaven will come back in the same way you have seen Him go up into heaven.”

Now, it’s really interesting. Scholars, when you study this, talk about three different specific words that talk about the ascension of Jesus. In those verse 9, verse 10. Separate words.

He is taken up. He is received into heaven. The picture is, now imagine you’re listening and it’s one of those times and Jesus is speaking. And He’s talking about what’s going to come.

And He’s giving you this assignment. And, like, mid-sentence, He just starts to elevate and elevate and elevate. And then this bright cloud comes around Him. And He elevates. And the word here for, it’s literally like they’re awestruck. It’s a medical term doctors, when someone would go to, like…

That’s the word used here. And in that moment, they’re snapped out of it by a couple angels that say, “Hey, guys. What’s surprises you about this? This same Jesus, who promised to return, who has talked to you about the kingdom of God, who gave you the outline of the great tsunami of grace, of redemption, and reconciliation, just the way He’s left, He’s going to come. Visibly. Physically. Bodily.”

He left at the Mount of Olives. He’ll be coming back at the Mount of Olives. The difference? He came the first time as a Savior to say, “Whosoever. Whosoever would turn from your sin and receive the free gift of forgiveness purchased in My blood. I want to love you and to save you and to forgive you.”

When He comes back He’ll come back as Judge. And He’ll come back on a white horse and upon His thigh it’ll be written, “faithful and true.” And He will now balance the scales and justice and equality and perfection as He ushers in a new heaven and a new earth.

And so what He tells the guys is, you know, verse 8? You can’t do this. It’s the Spirit of God in you. You’re going to receive power but it’s not you. It’s going to be the Spirit of God in you and you can endure anything because life is not just about now.

You have a Friend at the right hand of the Father who is praying for you now. You have an Advocate. And you can know for certain that whatever you have to go through, He’s going to come back, He will make things right, and earlier He told them, there’s great reward for those that go through a difficult life in a fallen world.

Finally, they responded in obedience to Jesus’ words and looked to Scripture for their marching orders. And so, remember what He said? He said, “I want you to go back until you get the promise.” Remember the promise? You’re going to be baptized with the Holy Spirit.

So, I want you to go back to Jerusalem and we’re going to learn it’s about, they call it a Sabbath day’s walk, which is about two thirds of a mile, and then we go back to, literally, the article is there, the upper room.

The same upper room, it’s on the third floor, holds between a hundred and twenty to a hundred and fifty people. And, you know, they’re going to just obey what He said. Now, can you imagine? They were running for their life just a few days ago.

They’ve had these amazing, emotional experiences, I mean, what would you talk to with, like, your best friend or your wife, after Jesus showed up, came through a wall, ate some fish, talked about some things, you felt His hands. You know, you’ve seen two or three amazing miracles and you realize, this is real. This is God. This is the Messiah. Now what do we do?

And then He goes up into the sky and says, “I want you to go back to Jerusalem and pray and wait and that’s, don’t do anything until you get the power.”

Well, we pick up the story. Verse 12, “Then they returned to Jerusalem from the hill called the Mount of Olives, a Sabbath day’s walk from the city. And when they arrived, they went upstairs to the room where they were staying. And those present were Peter and John and James and Andrew and Philip and Thomas, Bartholomew, and Matthew; James the son of Alphaeus and Simon the Zealot, and Judas the son of James. And they all joined together constantly in prayer, along with the women and Mary the mother of Jesus and his brothers.”

And in your Bibles, where it says, “in prayer” literally it’s “and the prayer.” Remember when they asked Jesus in Luke 11, “Teach us to pray?” And He teaches them the Lord’s prayer. And at the end He gives a little illustration. And then He says, “Ask, seek, knock.”

And then at the end of it He says, “And seek the Father and ask Him to give you the Holy Spirit.” See, they’re not praying just general prayers. One prayer, the prayer we know they’re praying, they’re praying that prayer that He taught them. And they’re praying, “God, You promised the Holy Spirit. We’re asking You to bring Him in our life right now.”

So, they meet Jesus, He goes into the air, the angels say this. And so, guess what – they go and they get before God.

One scholar that I trust a lot says, “As best we can figure, from the time He ascended until Pentecost, next week, when the Holy Spirit comes, it’s about ten days.”

So they’re ten days, kind of, in community. They’re praying and they’re sharing and, you know, during that time of sharing, what you’re going to find is, you know, they’re looking at the Old Testament passages and saying, you know, “I wonder what we should do? What’s the next step?”

And so we pick it up. Look at verse 15. “In those days, Peter stood up among the believers and a group numbering about a hundred and twenty and they said, ‘Brothers, the Scripture had to be fulfilled, which the Holy Spirit spoke long ago through the mouth of David concerning Judas, who served as a guide for those who arrested Jesus. He was the one of our number and shared in this ministry. With the reward he got for his wickedness, Judas bought a field and then he fell headlong, his body burst open, and his intestines spilled out. And everyone in Jerusalem heard about this so they called the field in their language, Akeldama, for it is the field of blood.’”

Now, before we go on you need to understand. So the story of Judas, if you’re familiar with the gospels, he betrays Jesus. And afterwards, he has this worldly sorrow and realized what he’s done. And he doesn’t repent. But what he does is he takes the thirty pieces of silver and he throws it into the face of the high priest.

And they’re thinking, “This is blood money. We don’t want it.” And so they bought this field where, you know, people that can’t afford a grave. And so it had become known that this field is called the field of blood.

And so they’re reciting, kind of, what’s happened in the days following all this, just, I mean, can you imagine the uproar in what’s occurring?

And then Peter is in community and he’s talking and he’s the point person at this point. And he quotes Psalm 69 and he says, “It’s written in the Book of Psalms, verse 25, ‘May this place be deserted; let there be no one to dwell in it.’”

And Peter says, “You know, that Psalm was talking about the issue with Judas.” And then he quotes Psalm 109 verse 8 and it says, “And may another take his place of leadership.”

And so all they know is we’re supposed to stay here and to pray and to wait and to tarry but the Bible is really clear that we had twelve, now we’ve got eleven, we’re supposed to discern who’s the next one.
So we pick up the story. Verse 21: “Therefore, it’s necessary to choose one of the men who have been with us from the whole time the Lord Jesus went in and out among us.

Beginning from John’s baptism to the time when Jesus was taken up from us. For one of these must come and become a witness with us of His resurrection.”

By the way, do you get their mission? Their mission wasn’t, “Let’s start a religion and be a little bit more moral than other people. Let’s start a religion and be really kind and nice. Let’s just start a religion and see if we can help the world out and make our lives more comfortable.”

They said, “No, no, no. There’s eleven of us and we’ve been given a global assignment. We are to be witnesses. We’re to, what we hear, what we see, what we experience of the resurrection. That there’s life after death. A Savior came, redemption occurred, reconciliation.”

I mean, these people are positive, focused, and missional. And then now, notice what happens. He says, “So they proposed two men: Joseph called Barsabbas and also Justus and Matthias. And then they prayed, ‘Lord, you know everyone’s heart. Show which of these two that You have chosen to take over this apostolic ministry, which Judas left to go to the place where he belongs.’ Then they drew lots and the lot fell to Matthias; so he was added to the eleven.”

Now, you might ask, you know, why would they draw lots? It’s because that’s the Old Testament way to discern God’s will when you’re not sure.

I mean, they knew both of these guys were qualified. But, from the time that Jesus was baptized by John to the time that He ascended, they’ve all been in these groups together and both of these guys are, as far as we know, very, very qualified.

And then there’s this very interesting word. It says, “But You, O Lord,” and there’s this very interesting word, “but You are the God who searches the heart.” Only You know. Who have You chosen, Lord? You know people’s motives. You know what’s going on down, deep inside.

And so because the Holy Spirit hasn’t come. And when He comes, what’s the promise? Jesus said, John 16, “He’ll guide you into the truth.” But right now, as Old Testament saints waiting for the Holy Spirit, they cast lots and what they did is obey the next thing that God showed them.

And what He said was, “Go pray.” They prayed. And they did it for ten days together. And then they said, “Oh, the Bible is clear that the next thing to do is not go, not talk. It’s to replace Judas.”

Now, here’s what you’ve got to understand. All through the book of Acts it is both descriptive and prescriptive. And so, what you do is you look through a lens and you say, in Acts chapter 1 we have Jesus giving His agenda for the planet to the very first followers of Christ.

This is exactly what you’re to do now. The question, then, is how do you take, what are the principles from Acts chapter 1 to what are Jesus’ words to us, His body, now, the twenty-first century.

And I’d like to suggest there’s four very clear applications to what Jesus wants this unstoppable tsunami wave of grace to build up in and through us and to go out from us.

Four things. Number one, we are to be confident in Jesus’ presence and purpose. You know, if there’s one thing I observe more and more about Christians, it’s like we have a self-image problem. We’re always concerned about what people think.

And, well, I can’t do that or I’m inadequate and, you know, I’m sure God uses other people but not really me. And there’s sort of this passive, the world’s a really hard, difficult. That’s not how they felt.

There’s a reason that Jesus, for forty days, taught them Bible studies about the kingdom reign of God and did miracles. Why? There’s a hundred and twenty of them and they’re going to reach the world.

By the way, two thousand years later, they’re doing pretty well. Why? They had confidence in the person of Christ. And they had confidence in the purpose of Christ.

Here’s the principle. The principle, from the very words of Jesus, “His Kingdom will come and His will will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”

Now, that great movement of God from Genesis chapter 3 that went through the Old Testament and there were prophets and the Old Testament and then Jesus comes and there’s a supernatural birth and there’s a resurrection.

And then there’s movement of the early Church. I want you to know, this tsunami wave of grace, it’s going to happen and He’s going to return and you either jump on and ride that wave of grace and be a part of God’s Kingdom agenda or you’re a spectator and you watch it go by.

And the enemy of your soul will lure you into thinking that there’s security in a 401k or if you can get into that school, or have that girlfriend or that boyfriend, if your kids turn out like this. And seduce you into all kind of things that may be good things as a byproduct, but they’re not the unstoppable agenda.

And He calls you and He calls me to ride the wave. To get on what God is doing. Because it’s going to happen. It’s a done deal. The score. You may not know all the plays. The score is final.

And God wants you to know His Kingdom will come. And the key word is faith. His key word is, “Will you believe Me?” And so we need to be confident. We need to ride the wave.

You need to begin to live in such a way where you expect God to do supernatural things. You expect Him to open the hearts of people you work with. You expect Him to provide your needs in ways you didn’t understand. You expect that things you think could never change in your marriage actually can.

And then you begin to step out and take steps of faith. And you know what? God will honor that. He’s pleased to. And without faith it’s impossible to please Him. But, boy, those who do? When we take tiny steps, our Father’s heart rejoices and He’s there to help.

The second part of God’s agenda for twenty-first century Christians is to be clear on your calling. What are we called to do?

The principle here is that every believer is a full-time missionary bearing witness to Jesus’ supernatural life in them.

Acts 1:8 is as true for us today as it was for them. You have received power. The Holy Spirit is in you. And the issue isn’t, are you going to “witness for Him.” You are a witness if you’re part of His family.

And all of us, and we have good days and bad days, but we’re either a dynamic, positive witness or a bad witness. There’s people that meet me, or meet you, or see me relate to other people and they come to conclusions about Jesus, the Church, grace, and life when they look at me and when they look at you.

And, of course, my prayer is that the great majority of that time it’ll be positive. But there’s a whole world out there, they just think Christians are nuts. They just think we’re narrow, prejudiced, bigoted, unkind, uncaring, racist.

And you know why? Because a lot of people who name the name of Christ are like that. And the breakthrough will come when legitimate followers of Christ, like you and me, when Christians live like Christians. But you’re a missionary.

What he had to help them understand back then was, it’s not about your political, national interest. And that’s true for us.

There’s a global agenda. And there’s lots of good causes. There’s this cause, this cause. And there’s lots of good causes that can get us off track. We have spent decades attacking rotten fruit. The rotten fruit of that in our society. The rotten fruit of that in our society. The rotten fruit of that in society. And the rotten fruit of that society.

Jesus says, “I want to go to the root, not the fruit.” When people’s hearts get changed, communities change. And the laws may change, the laws may not change, but the supernatural work of the tsunami grace of God didn’t come politically and it didn’t come legislatively. I think I just made up a new word.

But it came because people’s lives were changed. Key word here is “missional.” We’ve got to be a people, 24/7. I want to be a missionary in my home. I want to be a missionary in my neighborhood. I want to be a missionary where I work out. I want to be a missionary 24/7 where people see the love of Christ, the holiness of Christ.

But you know what? If we, you know what happens to churches? As soon as you get a little bit of success, we start thinking about: how do we protect our stuff? This group didn’t have any buildings, didn’t have any staff, didn’t have any money, didn’t have any DVDs, didn’t have any satellites, and didn’t have any Bibles. And they changed the world.

Why? Because they were missional. They weren’t trying to figure out, “Well, what works for us? And if we had a little bit more of this it’d be more comfortable.” They were saying, “The risen Christ lives in me now through the Holy Spirit and I’m on task and I’m a part of the tsunami grace of redemption and reconciliation.”

And by the way, this doesn’t mean that tomorrow you need to share the four laws or the bridge illustration. How about getting to know your neighbor’s names? I mean, how about just inviting some people over and say, “I’d love to hear your story. How long you been in the area?” Just befriend people. Be nice to people at work. Get out of the cubby hole mentality. My world, my stuff, my pressure, my emails. Be missional.

Third, He says be dependent on the Holy Spirit. I just want to remind you, we can’t do this. I can’t do it, you can’t do it. And the principle here is apart from Him, you can do nothing.

Jesus, the last time, when they turned the Passover to the Lord’s Supper for the very first time, He had already washed their feet, and then He walks with them and as He walks with them, they go to where He’s going to pray and this will be His last night.

And as they go there, He begins to talk about Him being the true vine. And His Father being the vinedresser.

And about, “All that you men need to know, I’ve taught you a lot. All you need to do is abide. You just need to be connected to Me. And the way you’re going to be connected to Me is going to be in the power of the Holy Spirit. It’s going to be in the context of My words. And if you will just stay connected to Me, I’ll produce the fruit through you. Apart from Me,” this isn’t about getting rah, rah. This isn’t about your fleshly energy.

Anything that you start in the flesh you have to remain and sustain in the flesh. Anything that is launched in the Spirit is maintained and sustained by the Spirit.

This is about trusting God to do supernatural things in you and through you as you, before God, in community, on mission, allow the Word of God, by the Spirit of God to take birth in your heart and you take steps of faith and obedience. Key word here is prayer.

I had a chance to speak at Liberty University last Friday. And a young twenty-four, twenty-five year old who went to school there and now works in, sort of, the convocation department of, you know, they have about ten thousand students that come in the basketball arena every Friday for devotions. Actually, Monday, Wednesday, and Friday.

And I had a chance to speak to those students. But, you know, came in kind of late and so we got to talk to this young gal and, you know, within, like, you know, it was about a fifty minute ride and Theresa and I got out of the car and thought, “Man, she is one godly, amazing, young woman.”

And you know how you meet someone and you think this conversation went way deeper than we should ever go in, like, fifty minutes.

And then we got to know them just a little bit and we met her boyfriend and a little bit of their journey and then, you know, we had a fifty-minute ride back. And it got way, way deeper. And I just thought, I mean, it was like I know their vision is to have eighty-five percent of all their students graduate and go into “the marketplace” as representatives and ambassadors for Christ. I said, “Man, if they produce people like her, they are going to shake the world.”

And as we were going she said, “You know, I grew up in a good Christian home and, you know, it was a different story. You know, I’m close with my dad, my mom and dad are still married. I had devotions. I went to this Bible college and, you know, it was pretty, pretty strict in some ways.

“But, you know, I got up every morning and I read the Bible.” But she said, “One day, the president of our school did something that changed my life.” I said, “What’s that?” She said, “He held up this tiny, little book. It was an old, old book by E.M. Bounds called The Power of Prayer.

“And he challenged us in chapel. If you will read this book and then pray ten minutes in the morning, ten minutes at noon, and ten minutes at night, just for six months, I’ll give you this book.”

She said, “I just felt like God prompted me so, you know, I went down and I picked up this book.” And if you’ve ever read the book, I mean, it’s like, whew. It’s a really powerful book on prayer. Very challenging.

And so she said, “You know, I was reading my Bible, candidly, I was a very good, moral person.” She goes, “I read that book on prayer and I began to see God’s promises and to expect supernatural things. And, you know, ten minutes doesn’t sound very long. But, like, for ten minutes deeply and then ten minutes at noon and then, like, ten minutes at night.”

She goes, “My life changed. My view of God changed. I saw God doing things I’d never seen before. I came out of a good home, I’m in a Bible school, I was reading the Bible. But the power of God. The supernatural power of God and my view of Him and what He could do and what He wanted to do with me. It was revolutionized when I began to really pray.”

That’s God’s agenda for us in the twenty-first century Church. We need to be confident, we need to be clear, and we need to be dependent. And probably the greatest evidence of my dependency, and your dependency is the depth, extent, and even, at times, length of your prayer life.

If it’s always on the run…and there’s two kinds of prayer. There’s the deep, secret prayer. You know, I mean, you get in your room, you sit quietly before God, there’s adoration, there’s confession, there’s thanksgiving, there’s intercession for others. And then there’s quiet listening, Lord, what would You want to say to me? Do You want to give me direction? Do You want to convict me? Do You want to show me anything?

And then there’s the get in your car, in meetings, traveling, talking with God throughout the day. I’m talking about that first kind right now.

How are you doing with that? That becomes a part of the culture more and more and more and more and more and your personal culture, you’ll see things happen that you think only happen to other people. Be confident. Be clear. Be dependent.

And finally, be obedient. But not in general. Be obedient to today’s truth. Did you notice those early disciples? I love this. Peter didn’t say, “Hey! Jesus said we’re supposed to reach the world. Come on, guys! Let’s go for it!”

What did he say? What’s the first truth? You just go and what we learned, for about the next ten days, and you just go pray. In fact, just wait. And while they’re waiting, Peter says, “Well, is there anything in our Bible,” he had the Old Testament, “is there anything in our Bible that we should be doing now?”

“Well, you know that passage in Psalm 69 is clear about the one who’s going to betray, I never saw that before but I’m sure glad you opened my mind to the Scriptures, Lord. And then that, you know, passage in 109 that we’re supposed to replace him.”

God’s will, today, is to obey the next thing. Now, I say that because, this is a confession, so please don’t think too little of me if I be just a bit honest here. There are times where God speaks very clearly to me about doing something. But I don’t want to do it.

So I read two more chapters of the Bible. He speaks to me about doing something and I don’t want to do it so I say to myself, “You know, honey, we’re giving to the church and Faith Promise, and Living on the Edge. You know what I think? Why don’t we just write a check here?”

He said, He tells me something He wants me to do and I think to myself, “You know, I wonder, I’m going to text so and so and just encourage them. You know, ‘Hey, brother, how you doing? Just was thinking.’ And I’ll pray for them right now.” And I really will.

You know? And I’m doing all these sort of things that are, kind of, good Christian sort of things that I know. But they’re not the next thing.

And sometimes we play games with God and, honestly, you know how you become a rigid, legalistic, uncaring, religious person that drifts far away from God and is convinced that you’re really close to Him is when you haven’t obeyed the next thing. Because your heart gets hard. And then you stuff all this religion in it. And then you play all these games.

If God tells you to confront someone and you read more of the Bible, you sin. So, if God is telling you, “You know what? You need…” Maybe there’s someone that you realize they’re drifting away from the Lord. “I don’t want to talk to them, God. You know, it might ruin the relationship, I don’t know what to say.”

If He’s telling you to talk to someone, to confront them, do it. If He’s telling you today, “You need to apologize to someone or forgive them.” Do it. Do it today. If He’s saying, “I want you to share the gospel with a neighbor or a co-worker.” Then, you know, we’ve got a relationship, I know, just, just do it. Get on your email and say, “Could we have lunch? Can I buy you a coffee?”

And then you open the question with, “Has anyone ever shared with you how much God loves you and how to have a relationship with Him?”

And if he says, “No, and I don’t want to” you’re off the hook. But do it! God doesn’t put those promptings in your heart unless He’s been preparing someone.

If God says to you, “Deal with the porn issue. Get counseling. Start getting your finances in order today.” Whatever it is, do it. Because if you don’t do the next step where He speaks, here’s the principle, Mark chapter 4, from the lips of Jesus: “If you do not respond to the light or the truth God gives you, then He’ll take away the truth that you have.”

If you respond to the light that He gives you, He’ll give you more light.

See, the organ of spiritual growth is not knowledge. Here’s the key word. The organ of spiritual growth is application. Jesus would say after His greatest sermon, “Let Me show you two kind of people. Some build on the rock, some build on the sand, it all looks the same, the activities are the same, there’s one difference. This group applies it; this group doesn’t.”

What would happen if every one of us just in quietness before the Lord said, “Would You just show me the next thing?” By the way, that’s why it’s hard to pray. You know why it’s hard to pray? Because when you get real quiet it reveals your spiritual poverty and my spiritual poverty.

And what it reveals is that, in other words, if I get real quiet, I have this deep down sense that I’m going to hear something I don’t want to hear. I don’t want to apologize to my wife. I don’t want to hear, “Go to counseling.” I don’t want to forgive my dad. He’s a jerk. Right?

I don’t want to get my finances in order. I know I got a lot of debt but, you know, gosh, it’s going to be a pain, I have to own up to some stuff. I don’t want to deal with my addiction.

But I’ll tell you this: you take the next first step and God will give grace and God will bring people and you’ll have freedom and you’ll know the truth and the truth will set you free. And you know what? You’ll experience something you never experienced. Guess what – now you’re a witness.

See, because, when they took the early disciples and said, “Shut up! You can’t talk about this anymore.” They said, “Who should we obey? Man or God? We can’t stop talking about this Jesus.” Why? Because they were experiencing Him. You only experience Him if you obey the truth for today.