The Power of the Spirit 3/4/45
Scripture: Acts 1: 1-8
Text: Acts 1: 8; “Ye shall receive power when the Holy Spirit is come upon you.”
[Several people tonight have been baptized and received into membership in the Church of Jesus Christ. This is by no means merely joining another club or society for them.] Joining the Christian church is an acceptance of Jesus as the greatest leader known to man. It is the expression of a desire to live according to Christian principles. It is a declaration of faith in God whom Jesus helps us to understand as a loving spiritual father at the same time that he is the moving wise and just spirit of the universe. It is an expression of loyalty to all of the nobler aspects of life as opposed to the drag of baseness and wrong.
It should be the purpose of all of us who have joined the Christian church to live the best and finest lives of which we are capable. And it is the duty of all professing Christians and older church members to help those who enter from time to time both by word and example. That is why people band themselves together in churches; so that they may help, and receive help, in this great enterprise of godly living in a world that in so many ways is ungodly. The experience of actually being joined to the church with others who are after the same things you seek is one of the sources of power for the Christian. Those who have tried it find it so. But even more than that is needed. We need some of the power which God only can give. And I propose that we try to qualify for such a gift of grace.
You remember that the apostles of Jesus had had the influence and privilege of close companionship with Jesus for three years. They took him for their leader. They believed in God as Jesus taught them to believe. After his death, they still had the advantage of each others’ fellowship. But they seemed hardly strong enough spiritually to tackle the great, seemingly almost impossible, job of taking the Christian message to all people and trying to make them understand it so as to believe in it. Peter and some of the others had thought some of throwing it up and had even gone off fishing. But they all received power in the experience of Pentecost, one day, that set them to their jobs with enthusiasm. With that power, they were able to set out to speak the truth and preach the gospel to everyone in the face of danger and misunderstanding and death.
I should like to call your attention to that spiritual power. The New Testament is full of it. There is no political power, no power of wealth or of position in the New Testament. Not many worldly wise or mighty, were followers of Jesus or members of the early churches. And yet among the simple people of the New Testament stories there is a sense of great power. Paul boldly and confidently says, “I can do all things through Christ, who strengtheneth me.” [Philippians 4: 13].
This spiritual power was used by these people chiefly for achieving a pure and noble life and for resisting evil. These people were fighting the battle of right and wrong in a corrupt world. There was much mental and spiritual seduction, licentiousness and rottenness in their world, just as in ours today. Yet they managed to keep themselves remarkably unspotted from that world.
They preached against fiercest opposition. They refused to be discouraged by persecution and ridicule. If driven out of one city, they carried their message on to the next. If they were told to keep still, they said that they would rather obey God than man. When forbidden to meet together for prayer and worship, they found secret places in which to meet. When they became poor, hungry, cold or naked they bore their sufferings without complaining. Surely they had spiritual power.
This story is told of Diognetius, who was brought before a heathen king for his stubbornness. The tyrant king said, “Do you know what I can do to you?” Said Diognetius, “You can not harm me, my life is hid with Christ in God.”
“I will strip you of all your possessions.”
“You can not reach them, my treasure is in heaven.”
“I will exile you to a barren island.”
“Nothing can separate me from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus my Lord.”
“Then I will kill you.”
“You will but send me to be with Christ, which is far better.”
No king, councils of kings, or dictator can touch the spirit of a man like that. He had a spiritual power that was far more than any political or other earthly power.
One thing must be noticed about the spiritual power of the early Christians. They used it to keep themselves pure and unafraid and they would not be silenced. The early Christians expected themselves and each other to keep away from evils, but they did little to stop the evils. Their program was an individual program. They did nothing to the world except as they gathered in individuals. Their job was not so much that of aggression as of endurance. They felt themselves to be only citizens of their churches rather than of the community at large. Their churches were the only communities where they could practice love, purity, brotherhood, and democratic justice. Their churches were the only communities where they could meet their social problems in a Christian spirit. There is in the New Testament no program of citizenship in the larger community as a whole. But the early Christians were remarkably successful in putting their Christianity to practice in their churches.
To be a Christian in those days was difficult and dangerous. It called for unusual sanctity of life. One had to dare the world’s harshness and wickedness and at the same time to keep free from its pollutions. In some ways, we live in a much easier day. If we want to be temperate and pure in heart, there are many who want the same thing and will help us; if we want to preach our gospel, no one stops us; if we want to worship God, our assemblies are protected by law. We are not in much danger of physical persecution.
Yet we have, in other ways, a more difficult task. In addition to keeping ourselves pure as the early Christians did, we are called upon to do our part in improving conditions around us. In other words, we are citizens with duties concerning the common welfare of all. Our task is not just to seek salvation for ourselves, not just to purify the church; it is to help purify society itself. [No man can hope to lead a better life without attempting to purify conditions around him.] Instead of submitting to wicked governors, our task is to help put good ones in office. Instead of entirely keeping away from theaters and games, as some Christians still do, our job is to do the best we can to improve, control, and keep them clean.
Of course many have difficulty in seeing any connection between our religious life and these things that seem to be secular. We can think of the God of Israel all right, but we have difficulty in thinking of God as the God of America, and of Wisconsin Rapids. But God is always up to date, and present in any age or place. It is one of our weaknesses that we so often look back to the heroic days of the saints and wish, for the sake of our religious lives, that we had lived then. That is neither necessary nor desirable. The promise of Jesus is just as good to us as to them. “Ye shall receive power whenever the Holy Spirit comes upon you.” If you expect the gift of growing power, it will come. Try it.
Where shall we find spiritual power? Right where the New Testament saints found it - in the task of the day. When Paul needed light on how to treat the Christians, he got it, and turned from a persecutor to an ardent Christian himself. When the disciples faced the discouraging task of evangelizing the world after Jesus’ crucifixion, they were at first discouraged. They needed more spiritual power. Well, they got it. When Jesus himself needed more strength for another day’s ministry, he prayed alone in the night, and he received it. When he fought fear in the garden of Gethsemane and even prayed that the bitter cup of crucifixion might pass from him, he was given the spiritual power to go ahead.
If we, today, need the power to clean and purify our lives and desire that power with heart, soul, and mind, we will get it. If we need spiritual power to help us stand against iniquity in social and public life, we will get it.
We can find God best in this complicated enterprise of social living. If we want gracious and beautiful families, happy, effective educational societies, honorable and kindly communities, just and generous industries, sacrificial public service, and a world free from the foulness of war - if we want these things earnestly enough, we can get them. The power is available and we will see that God is in these enterprises.
When the city council of Chicago some years ago voted to open the session with prayer, I felt cynical. But why not? It is a good idea, isn’t it? The council men are administering sacred things. They control health conditions of the city. They oversee traffic regulations involving the safety of millions. Their police force is supposed to guard homes. They are charged with the responsibility of taking the tax contributions of every citizen of the city and of carefully expending that money for the common good. If God is not interested in these things, then my understanding of God is mistaken.
Bankers of Spokane, Washington, are reported to have asked a minister to address them on the subject, “God.” These men know financial problems. They know the significance of money, value, price. They understand discounts, loans, commissions, railroad charges, prices of fruit, tariffs to fight competition and so on. Why shouldn’t they turn their attention also to the human values, the workers in the orchards, the renters, the city children in slums who seldom taste fruit? Certainly they should be interested in these things, but they need spiritual power to cope with them.
Now how can we get spiritual power? After all, it is something that is more like a gift than something we can grasp.
(1) In the first place, it does not come to us unless we want it. The gift of any kind of power always carries with it the responsibility to use that power, and use it rightly. Power that is not used or is misused is generally taken away from us.
A boy whose father was dead and whose mother had to earn a living for both of them once said that he would like a religion without any rules so that he could do only what he himself thought was right. When he discussed it further he began to see that liberty itself involves some deeper obligations and responsibilities. He saw the point and blurted out, “Aw, I wouldn’t like a religion like that; I would have to wash the dishes every day.” He didn’t want the Holy Spirit to come upon him at that time; spiritual power would harness him to difficult tasks. It always does! When you try it, you realize that.
(2) In the second place, spiritual power comes to us when we really need it and know that we need it. When life gets too easy for us and we become too satisfied with our lot, let us beware. For the spiritual resources, being unused, are likely to leave us from disuse. On the other hand, when we get in a pinch; when life becomes a spiritual or physical struggle; that is the time we turn most easily to prayer and that is the time we may best expect power if we want it and are willing to try it.
I suppose that no generation has faced problems any more confusing than ours. We can equip ourselves to meet the complex social life of today it we want to. The pure in heart, those who are willing to learn, those who are sincere in their purposes, those who really want to know the truth and to do right, they shall see God.
“Ye shall receive power when the Holy Spirit is come upon you.”
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Dates and places delivered:
Kahului Union Church, May 18, 1930
Puunene Japanese Church, May 25, 1930
Wailuku Union Church, June 1, 1930
Wailuku Japanese Church, June 8, 1930
Makawao Union Church, June 29, 1930
Paia Japanese Church, October 19, 1930
Kahului Union Church, April 2, 1933
Huelo Hawaiian Church, July 2, 1933
Pauwela Hawaiian Church, July 16, 1933
Puunene Hawaiian Church, July 23, 1933
Kahului Union Church, September 29, 1935
Wananalua Church, Hana, April 19, 1936
Pilgrim Church, April 4, 1937 AM
Wisconsin Rapids, March 4, 1945