Get It Straight, Boys!
But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you
(Acts 1:8).
Daily Fire: God’s power is given only to enable me to be His witness.
When we read the
opening verses of the book of Acts, we see why Jesus twice stressed the coming
of the power of the Holy Spirit, in His last conversation on earth: And being
assembled together with them, He commanded them not to depart from Jerusalem,
but to wait for the Promise of the Father, “which,” He said, “you have heard
from Me; for John truly baptized with water, but you shall be baptized with the
Holy Spirit not many days from now.” Therefore, when they had come together,
they asked Him, saying, “Lord, will You at this time restore the kingdom to
Israel?” And He said to them, “It is not for you to know times or seasons which
the Father has put in His own authority. 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.” Now when He had spoken
these things, while they watched, He was taken up, and a cloud received him out
of their sight. (Acts 1:4–9) Jesus had given His final instructions to the
apostles after His resurrection and told them to wait for the promise of the
Holy Spirit. That seemed fine—surely they had got the point and knew what was
going to happen. But no! In verse 6, they were floundering again in the old
notion that Jesus had spent three years trying to get out of their system: that
of political triumph for Israel led by Jesus as the Warrior-Lord. Jesus had to
correct them, and insist that their interests were not to lie in the direction
of restored political power for Israel.
They were to go beyond
Israel and preach the gospel to all nations! The power He would give would not
be for political victory, but to achieve a far more significant result: the
moral and spiritual victory of the kingdom of God. Today you and I must
continue to preach and proclaim the gospel to the nations in our own way.
