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Feb 04, 2024

The Spirit and Speaking

The Spirit and Speaking

Speaker: Patrick Lafferty

Series: That’s the Spirit: Learning to keep in step with Him who indwells

Keywords: power, holy spirit, boldness, speaking

What was it all for? Why devote close to a year learning from and about the Holy Spirit? So much of what we considered focused on his purposes for us personally and communally. We want to conclude our particular attention to the Spirit with a focus on the public purpose the Spirit has for us, in us, and through us. You could say all else He does in us as individuals and among us as Christ’s church has our final subject His final objective.

Readings & Scripture

PREPARATION: Isaiah 52:7, 9

LEADER: How beautiful upon the mountains
are the feet of him who brings good news,
who publishes peace, who brings good news of happiness,
who publishes salvation,
who says to Zion, “Your God reigns.”

ALL: Break forth together into singing,
you waste places of Jerusalem,
for the LORD has comforted his people;
he has redeemed Jerusalem.

AFFIRMATION OF FAITH: Matthew 28:16-20
LEADER: Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them. 17 And when they saw him they worshiped him, but some doubted. 18 And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.

CENTRAL TEXT: Acts 1:1-8 / 4:13-31
Acts 1:1 In the first book, O Theophilus, I have dealt with all that Jesus began to do and teach, 2 until the day when he was taken up, after he had given commands through the Holy Spirit to the apostles whom he had chosen. 3 He presented himself alive to them after his suffering by many proofs, appearing to them during forty days and speaking about the kingdom of God.

Acts 1:4 And while staying with them he ordered them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the promise of the Father, which, he said, “you heard from me; 5 for John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now.”

Acts 1:6 So when they had come together, they asked him, “Lord, will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?” 7 He said to them, “It is not for you to know times or seasons that the Father has fixed by his own authority. 8 But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.”

Acts 4:13 Now when they saw the boldness of Peter and John, and perceived that they were uneducated, common men, they were astonished. And they recognized that they had been with Jesus. 14 But seeing the man who was healed standing beside them, they had nothing to say in opposition. 15 But when they had commanded them to leave the council, they conferred with one another, 16 saying, “What shall we do with these men? For that a notable sign has been performed through them is evident to all the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and we cannot deny it. 17 But in order that it may spread no further among the people, let us warn them to speak no more to anyone in this name.” 18 So they called them and charged them not to speak or teach at all in the name of Jesus. 19 But Peter and John answered them, “Whether it is right in the sight of God to listen to you rather than to God, you must judge, 20 for we cannot but speak of what we have seen and heard.” 21 And when they had further threatened them, they let them go, finding no way to punish them, because of the people, for all were praising God for what had happened. 22 For the man on whom this sign of healing was performed was more than forty years old.

Acts 4:23 When they were released, they went to their friends and reported what the chief priests and the elders had said to them. 24 And when they heard it, they lifted their voices together to God and said, “Sovereign Lord, who made the heaven and the earth and the sea and everything in them, 25 who through the mouth of our father David, your servant, said by the Holy Spirit,
“‘Why did the Gentiles rage,
and the peoples plot in vain?
26 The kings of the earth set themselves,
and the rulers were gathered together,
against the Lord and against his Anointed’—

Acts 4:27 for truly in this city there were gathered together against your holy servant Jesus, whom you anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, along with the Gentiles and the peoples of Israel, 28 to do whatever your hand and your plan had predestined to take place. 29 And now, Lord, look upon their threats and grant to your servants to continue to speak your word with all boldness, 30 while you stretch out your hand to heal, and signs and wonders are performed through the name of your holy servant Jesus.” 31 And when they had prayed, the place in which they were gathered together was shaken, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and continued to speak the word of God with boldness.

BENEDICTION: Revelation 22:17
LEADER: The Spirit and the Bride say, “Come.” And let the one who hears say, “Come.” And let the one who is thirsty come; let the one who desires take the water of life without price.

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS:

  1. Who was the one person who first (or most) guided you in your understanding of Jesus? Was there anything about them that made what they said compelling at the time (or later)?
  2. What were the disciples expecting there in Acts 1–and how did Jesus recalibrate their expectation?
  3. [read Acts 3 for the context to explain what’s happening in our passage in Acts 4]. Summarize the build-up to Peter’s moment before the Jewish council, the Sanhedrin. [Before you look at one person’s answer,] in what corner had the council been painted? In other words, how was any decision they made in response to what happened in Acts 3 tinged with problems?
  4. How would you describe the “boldness” Peter and others both exhibited and prayed for? How is boldness here both a departure from timidity, but also a departure from sheer brashness?
  5. For what did they–and we–depend from the Spirit in our public witness to Christ?
  6. What are your greatest hurdles or apprehensions to speaking of what they spoke of?

ILLUSTRATIONS:  

QUOTES: 

 

  • I would say that if you don’t believe that Jesus of Nazareth was the Christ and Messiah, and that he rose again from the dead and by his sacrifice our sins are forgiven, you’re really not in any meaningful sense a Christian. . . .Christianity, remember, is really founded by St. Paul, not by Jesus. Paul says, very clearly, that if it is not true that Jesus Christ rose from the dead, then we the Christians are of all people the most unhappy. If none of that’s true, and you seem to say it isn’t, I have no quarrel with you. . . .I’m sorry, fundamentalist simply means those who think that the Bible is a serious book and should be taken seriously. Christopher Hitchens
  • [We must] learn how to embody in the life of the church a witness to the kingship of Christ over all life – its politics and economics no less than its personal and domestic morals. . . .Lesslie Newbigin
  • Suppose this black pit of a kingdom of yours is the only world. Well, it strikes me as a pretty poor one. And that's a funny thing, when you come to think of it. We're just babies making up a game, if you're right. But four babies playing a game can make a play-world which licks your real world hollow. That's why I'm going to stand by the play world. I'm on Aslan's side even if there isn't any Aslan to lead it. I'm going to live as like a Narnian as I can even if there isn't any Narnia. So, thanking you kindly for our supper, if these two gentlemen and the young lady are ready, we're leaving your court at once and setting out in the dark to spend our lives looking for Overland. Not that our lives will be very long, I should think; but that's a small loss if the world's as dull a place as you say. Puddleglum in C.S. Lewis’s The Silver Chair

 

 

  • . . .the most powerful, pervasive, and dangerous culture to the gospel is the West, which has now spread its seductive gospel to every part of the urban world. The church is called to rouse itself from its enchantment, and rooted in Christ and empowered by the Spirit, show what it really means to be human. Michael Goheen

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SERMONS