You Have Been Given a Mission:
- You have the MESSAGE : Be CONFIDENT ! (Acts 1:1-5)
- You have the OBJECTIVE : Stay FOCUSED ! (Acts 1:6-7)
- You have the POWER : Be a WITNESS ! (Acts 1:8a)
- You have the DIRECTIONS : Get MOVING ! (Acts 1:8b)
- You have the one OPPORTUNITY : TAKE IT ! (Acts 1:9-11)
Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
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Alright, open up your Bibles with me please.
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The book of Acts.
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Last week we were in Matthew chapter 16 and we saw Jesus talking about the church long before the church began.
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And in Matthew chapter 16 Jesus said that the church was going to be supernatural.
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He said, "I will build my church." And Jesus said it was going to be something protected.
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He said, "I will build My church." The church belongs to Jesus.
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We closed last week saying that the church was going to be unstoppable.
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Jesus said that the gates of hell will not prevail against His church.
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That the devil would like to put a fence around the church.
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The devil would like to stop this thing from happening and growing.
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And Jesus said, "Not even the gates of hell will stop the church." And that's going to lead us right into the book of Acts.
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In Acts chapter 1, Acts was written by Luke.
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And it's actually the sequel to the Gospel according to Luke.
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Just like Mark, we spent the last two years covering the Gospel according to Mark, Luke Luke wrote an account of what happened with Jesus, and Acts is Luke's second writing that talks about what happened after Jesus returned to the Father.
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When we get to the book of Acts, we see at this point in history, the work of redemption is done.
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You know, the work of Jesus on the cross, saving us from our sins, resurrecting, giving us the promise of eternal life. The work of redemption is done, but now Jesus has a job for us to do. And this morning we're going to be talking about the mission. The mission.
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What was that TV show or what was that clip from? You know, "Your Mission If You Choose to Accept It." What was that from? Is that from Mission Impossible? Okay, so like this This morning, your mission, if you choose to accept it, we have the mission from Jesus Christ.
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Our mission is about making disciples.
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And in order to make disciples, we need to get the gospel out.
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And you know the Bible says something interesting about the gospel.
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In Romans 1.14, Paul says that he's obligated to share the Gospel.
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He has a debt to share the Gospel.
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And as born again believers in Jesus Christ, you have a debt to share the Gospel.
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And I want to show you what that means.
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Does somebody have a dollar?
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Somebody have a dollar?
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Somebody borrow me a dollar?
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Hey, thank you very much.
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Just one, that's fine.
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Thank you.
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Thank you very much, Darren.
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Okay, so I borrowed a dollar from Darren.
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So now, I'm indebted to him to pay him back one dollar, right?
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Okay, that's one way of being in debt.
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But there's another way of being in debt.
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And it would be just simply this.
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If I went to Justin and I said, "Hey, I owe Darren a dollar.
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Would you give this to him the next time you see him?
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Now who has the debt?
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Justin has the debt, doesn't he?
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I'm free and clear.
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Justin's probably going to keep that dollar.
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Justin's like, "Woohoo!
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Michelle, anything at the dollar menu at McDonald's?" It's on Darren today.
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But you see, now he has the debt.
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Now let that dollar represent the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
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You see, God has given it to us because His intention is that we give it to someone else.
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You understand that by virtue of being born again, by virtue of being saved, by virtue of having the Gospel, you're automatically indebted to give that Gospel, to share that Gospel with people that don't have it.
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God wants to get it to them.
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How is God going to get it to them?
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You see, just like I needed to get that dollar to Darren, but I gave it to Justin, and now he has the debt, understand that that's how it works with the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
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God says, "There's a lost and dying world out there, and I want to get the Gospel to them." So He gives it to us.
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That's why the Bible says we are entrusted with the Gospel.
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The reason that I gave that dollar to Justin is because I trust him.
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You wouldn't give it to somebody that you don't trust.
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And the Lord is trusting you with His Gospel.
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And like Paul said in Romans 1:14, I'm obligated. I'm indebted.
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I have to get this out because God gave it to me to give out.
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You need to see yourself in the same mission.
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So on your outline today, as we kick off the book of Acts, you have been given a mission.
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Number one, write this down.
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You have the message.
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Be confident.
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You have the message.
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Be confident.
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Luke writes, "In the first book, O Theophilus..." The first book was the Gospel according to Luke.
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Theophilus was apparently this man that Luke was addressing these writings to.
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"In the first book, O Theophilus, have dealt with all that Jesus began to do and teach.
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Until the day when He was taken up after He had given command through the Holy Spirit to the apostles whom He had chosen.
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He presented Himself alive to them after His suffering by many proofs, appearing to them during 40 days and speaking about the Kingdom of God.
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So you have the message.
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Be confident.
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What is the message?
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The message is that Jesus rose from the dead.
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Did you see that in v. 3?
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He presented Himself alive to them after His suffering by many proofs.
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By many proofs.
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On a scale of 1 to 10, how convinced were the disciples that Jesus Christ rose from the dead?
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How convinced do you think they were?
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They were 10 at this point, right?
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Many proofs.
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Jesus showed up actually over the span of 40 days.
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That doesn't mean that He stayed with them continuously 40 days.
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We see that He showed up in intervals.
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Many convincing proofs.
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He had eaten with them.
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He had allowed them to touch Him.
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Many convincing proofs.
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You see, the resurrection of Jesus Christ is the message that has eternal significance.
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Because through Jesus' death In His resurrection, as I had said, He defeated sin and death.
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And because of the ministry of Jesus Christ, we are forgiven of our sins 100%.
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We are totally forgiven because God poured out His wrath on His Son while Jesus was on the cross.
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And by raising from the dead, Jesus gives us the promise of eternal life.
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The life that man had forfeited in the Garden of Eden by rebelling against God.
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Jesus, by His resurrection, says I'm going to restore that to you.
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But understand that Luke starts off the book of Acts by saying, listen, this is significant.
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Jesus resurrected, and it wasn't just rumor that He resurrected.
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It wasn't just a couple people I think maybe they might have seen Him down at the Quickie Mart or whatever hanging out with Elvis.
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No, we saw Jesus.
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Many convincing proofs.
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There wasn't a doubt in our minds that Jesus Christ had resurrected.
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Being indebted with the Gospel, as I mentioned earlier, you have a message that every single person on this planet to hear.
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You have that message.
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Everybody you know that doesn't know Christ, everyone you know that doesn't know Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, whether they admit it, whether they hide it, they're living in shame.
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They're living in guilt.
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They're living in fear.
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They're living in hopelessness.
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They're lost.
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They don't even know that they're lost.
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You have the message that they need to hear.
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It's good news.
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Hey, God loves you.
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God sent His Son to die for you.
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You see, that is what makes Christianity distinct from every religion on the face of the planet.
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You can line them all up.
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Any other religion teaches that there are some things that we need to do to make God happy.
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Do these religious acts.
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Go through these rituals.
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Do these things to make God happy.
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Christianity stands different than every single one of them because the Bible teaches us that there's nothing that we can do in and of ourselves to make God happy.
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God is the One who did the work to bring peace between man and God.
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Jesus did the work.
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What the Bible calls us to is to believe and receive Jesus Christ and the work that He accomplished on our behalf.
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That's good news.
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That's good news. We don't have to strive.
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We don't have to try.
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We don't have to wonder how many good works do I have to do to get to heaven?
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How nice do I have to be?
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How good do I have to be to get to heaven?
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We don't have to wonder because Jesus paid it on our behalf.
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The resurrection - that's a game changer.
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You can imagine the disciples at this point, you know, at first they didn't believe, right?
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At first the Bible says some doubted and Thomas was like, "Unless I touch him, I'm not going to believe." And at this point they were convinced.
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Jesus rose from the dead and they were starting to wrap their brains around the significance of that.
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So at this point the disciples were like, "Okay, we know Jesus rose from the dead and we have our marching orders, so let's go do it!" Look at verse 4, it says, "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, for'" that's John the Baptist, "for John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now." So the disciples are like, "Let's go do this, let's go tell people." And Jesus said, "No, wait.
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Don't leave and try to do this yourself." We talked about this last week.
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Jesus said, "I will build my church." He didn't need his people running out and trying to do it for him.
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Jesus said, "No, no, just wait.
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Because the Holy Spirit's coming and I will build my church as my Holy Spirit as it worked through you." "But Jesus, I got this." "No, you do not got this.
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Not without the Holy Spirit." Today I think some of the impact of what's happening in this passage might be lost on us.
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If you can imagine being a Jew living in the first century, what Jesus said in verse 5 might be the most radical thing they've ever heard in their lives.
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Because Jesus said, "You're unbaptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now." If you study the Holy Spirit in the Old Testament, as these Jews would have understood the Holy Spirit, they knew God's Holy Spirit would come upon people for a short period of time and to accomplish a purpose, and then He would seemingly leave.
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You see that over and over in the Old Testament.
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God's Spirit come upon someone in order to accomplish a purpose, and then God's Spirit would not stay and abide on that person.
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Jesus saying that you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit was a completely radically new doctrine for them; a completely radical and new teaching for them.
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The Holy Spirit was going to come and permanently dwell in God's people.
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Ezekiel talked about this in Ezekiel 36.
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Verses 26-27.
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The Lord says, "I will give you a new heart and a new spirit I will put within you.
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And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh." Listen to verse 27.
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It's in the Old Testament.
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"And I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes and be careful to obey My rules." In the Old Testament, the promise was coming God was going to allow His Spirit to permanently indwell His people.
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And that's what Jesus was talking about here.
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Like hey, the Father promised this.
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It's coming.
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Don't run off.
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If you stick around, the Holy Spirit is going to come.
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This is good news.
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This is good news.
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You know, we can talk about being indebted with the Gospel like the dollar.
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We can talk about the commands that the Bible gives to share the gospel with people.
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But you know really at the end of the day, when you stop and consider the gospel of Jesus Christ, you should want to share that with people.
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If you truly understand the gospel of Jesus Christ, if you've truly embraced it and allowed it to change you, I shouldn't have to give you a sales pitch to share the gospel with someone, true or false.
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I shouldn't have to talk you into that.
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I shouldn't have to get up here every week and be like, "Okay church, here's five reasons why you should share the gospel." If you have received the gospel and you're living in the power of the Holy Spirit, it should be something that you want to do.
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Because you can't keep good news to yourself.
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If you've ever been in that situation when you had to pass good news on to someone, maybe You heard the results from a doctor visit.
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You couldn't wait to share that.
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That's one of the great things about my job.
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I'm in that position all the time.
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When people say, "Hey, this prayer got answered.
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Will you tell the church?" "Hey, I know people are praying for me.
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Will you tell them the good news?" I'm in a position where I constantly have the privilege of relaying good news.
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You can't wait to tell.
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If you've received Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, and you know why it's so important to share Him with others.
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So that you can watch Jesus do to them what He did to you.
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You've been given a mission.
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First of all, you have the message.
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Be confident.
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The message is Jesus rose from the dead.
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He's given the promise of eternal life.
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He's given the promise of the Holy Spirit.
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Your sin can be forgiven and you can have the promise of heaven.
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That's good news.
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That is good news.
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You have the message.
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Let's be confident.
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Secondly, you have the objective.
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Stay focused.
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Look at verses 6 and 7.
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It says, "So when they came together, they asked Him, 'Lord, will You at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?'" We had talked about that in the Old Testament.
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It says the Messiah was going to come and suffer and reign over all the earth.
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The Jews thought that that was all going to happen at once.
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These disciples are like, "Ok, you know what?
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We are totally sold on the fact that you're the Messiah, and you came, and you suffered, ok, and according to our Scriptures, the next thing that's going to happen is you're going to rule over all the earth.
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You're going to be the king over everything." And the disciples here were saying, "Ok, that's what's next, right?
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Right Jesus?
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Right?
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This is, now you're going to restore Israel.
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You're going to reign over all the earth.
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That's going to happen now, right?
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Verse 7, "He said to them, 'It is not for you to know the times or seasons that the Father has fixed by His own authority.'" Jesus said this timing stuff, it's not your business.
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It's not your business.
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That's your business.
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It's the objective that Jesus gave us in Matthew 28, the Great Commission.
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Jesus said, "Go make disciples." That's your business.
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But what about the eschatological chart?
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When are you going to return and rapture and Day of the Lord?
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You know what?
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We don't need to worry about the timing of those things.
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Our business is to make disciples.
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Just like these disciples in Acts 1, The time is in the Father's hands.
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You need to focus on the task at hand.
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So you have the objective to stay focused.
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I would just encourage you church, don't get sidetracked.
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I'm saying this as a way of keeping each other accountable here.
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But as a church, let's not get sidetracked.
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I don't want this to come across critical and I don't have any particular church or ministry in mind.
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I'm just making a general statement and things that I've seen over the years, okay?
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So there's no hidden message here.
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This isn't some passive-aggressive hidden message.
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But just over the years, I've seen churches focusing on carnivals and concerts and blessing pets and blessing motorcycles and hosting Texas Hold 'Em poker tournaments with a cash bar and free draft beer.
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And I look at these things, Like, how does that fit the mission?
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Like I said, if that sounds critical, do you understand what I mean?
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Like, how does that fit the mission?
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That Jesus is like, "Go make disciples." And we're like, "Texas, hold 'em, cash bar." Like, how does that fit the mission?
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You know, I talked to a pastor years ago that says, "Yeah, we're blessing motorcycles at our church." Hey, I love motorcycles.
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But, shouldn't you be ministering to the people motorcycles, instead of just pull your bike up so I can lay hands on it and pray over your motorcycle. I just, I can understand it if Jesus was so ambiguous about the mission.
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If Jesus was just like, "Okay, go, go do stuff, okay? Go do stuff, I'm coming back, do stuff." I can understand where we'd be like, "Okay, here's the stuff I do," and you know, "Actually just hold them in blessing motorcycles." But Jesus was so specific. He said, "Go make disciples," Teach them to observe all that I've commanded you.
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So when it's so clear, I don't understand how we get so sidetracked, but I will say this, it is easy to get sidetracked.
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And that's why in our church we're constantly evaluating, whether it's worship or small group ministry or preaching or whatever, we're evaluating, are we making disciples?
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What we're doing here, does it fit into the overall ministry, the overall mission of making disciples?
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It's just too easy to get sidetracked.
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You have the objective.
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Stay focused.
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And thirdly, write this down.
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You have the power.
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Be a witness.
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You have the power.
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Be a witness.
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Look at the first part of verse 8.
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Jesus was like, "It's not for you to know the times or the seasons that the Father has fixed by His own authority, but you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you and you will be My witnesses." This is our verse for the year, okay?
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This is the verse of the year and you're going to hear this a lot this year Because everything that follows in the book of Acts is based on these two phrases.
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You will receive power.
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You will be My witnesses.
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Everything that follows.
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Spoiler alert, everything we're going to see in the book of Acts - God's people ministering the Gospel; people receiving the Gospel ; and in receiving the Gospel and believing in Jesus Christ, receiving power ; receiving the Holy Spirit.
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And upon receiving the Holy Spirit, being witnesses for Jesus Christ.
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So why do we receive power?
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Jesus said, "But you will receive power." Why do we receive power?
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We receive power so that we would be Christ's witnesses.
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Jesus didn't send the Holy Spirit to make you great.
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The Holy Spirit is about showing God's greatness through you.
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Certainly, God is about making you to be more like His Son.
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Romans 8.29 says that God wants to conform us into the image of His Son.
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And certainly, there is personal benefit in receiving the Holy Spirit the way that He works on us.
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But you have to see very specifically the reason that God gives us His Holy Spirit is so that we would be witnesses for Jesus Christ.
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Jesus made that so clear.
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What's a witness?
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What's a witness?
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Let's not overthink this.
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A witness is just simply somebody who sees something.
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And then they tell other people about what they saw.
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That's what a witness is.
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They see something and then they tell others.
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Here's what I saw.
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The last two years at our church, we went through the Gospel of Mark.
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you don't have to witness much about Jesus.
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If you're born again, you personally are a witness to Christ's power.
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When you're born again, I want you to think, born again believers, the way that Christ changed you.
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You know, when we do our membership interviews, that's what we ask people.
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Tell me the difference that Jesus Christ has made in your life.
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I love hearing those stories.
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I love it.
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I hear people say things like, "I was such an anxious person, God just gave me peace.
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And that's how He's changed me.
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Or you know, I hear people say, "I used to be so angry, and I lost my temper all the time." And God took that away from me.
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I used to be so depressed and discouraged, and now I have hope because of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
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He's changed me.
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And for every single person that has been born again, you have a testimony like that on how God's changed you.
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And that makes you a witness.
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You're somebody who first-hand has experienced the power.
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You too are a witness.
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So you don't choose whether you want to be a witness or not.
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You are a witness.
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I'm going to say that again.
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You don't choose whether or not you want to be a witness.
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You are a witness.
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The only question is what kind of a witness are you?
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This is so important because a lot of times when you talk to people about witnessing, you hear a lot of excuses.
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"I don't really have that much experience." "I would like to witness more, but I don't really have a lot of experience." I'm just not quite sure how to share the Gospel.
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Maybe if I was more creative.
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Being a witness isn't about experience or creativity or intellect.
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Being a witness just very simply boils down to one thing.
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It's telling people what you know.
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You don't have to be Billy Graham, or James MacDonald, or John MacArthur, or John Piper.
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You don't have to be those guys.
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You're not those guys.
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All that you need to do to be a witness is to tell people what you know about Jesus.
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If you're like, "Well, I don't really know that much about Jesus." Well, then maybe we need to witness to you.
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Because if you know enough about Jesus to get saved, you know enough about Jesus to share.
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And even if it's simply like, "Look, you know what?
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You're telling this co-worker, this unsafe co-worker, maybe all you know is this.
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Look, you know what?
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My life was a wreck and I started going to Harvest Bible Chapel and I've been seeking the Lord and I've really felt this sense of peace and things.
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Things really seem to be coming together in my life.
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You should come with me.
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Maybe at this point that's all you know.
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But you know that.
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So share that, right?
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You don't have to have our doctrinal statement memorized.
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You don't have to have Romans memorized.
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Work on those things.
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But you don't have to have them memorized.
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Share what you know.
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Jesus made a difference in my life, and He can do it for you too.
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We don't really have excuses because if you're born again, you're a witness.
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So you tell what you know.
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Here's the glorious thing.
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You tell what you know backed by divine power.
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It's not really up to you.
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Jesus didn't just say to the disciples, "Okay, I rose from the dead, now go be a witness.
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Go tell people." What did He say?
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"You will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes, and you will be My witnesses." What has to come first?
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You have to be filled with the Holy Spirit.
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You have to receive the Holy Spirit, which happens to every believer, by the way, upon getting saved.
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You have the power.
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You'll be My witness.
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Fourthly, you have the directions.
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Get moving.
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You have the directions.
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Get moving.
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Jesus said, "You'll be My witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth." Jesus said in the Great Commission, "Go, make disciples." Go, make disciples.
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The word "go" means that you have to move on it.
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So a question for you.
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I want you to think of somebody in your neighborhood that doesn't know Jesus Christ.
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Does God want that person saved?
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He does, doesn't He?
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I want you to think about that co-worker that doesn't know Jesus Christ.
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Does God want that person saved?
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I want you to think about that family member that doesn't know Jesus Christ.
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Does God want that family member saved?
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So how is that going to happen?
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How is that going to happen?
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It is going to happen through you, isn't it?
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God wants that person saved and He is going to go after that person through you.
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Your responsibility is to go.
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Meaning this, you're not saved to be a bench warmer.
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You're not saved so that you might sit on your couch and hope that maybe, maybe someday, someday I'm going to do something for God.
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Maybe if I sit on my couch, God will send unsaved people into my living room.
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The Great Commission is about going.
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Jesus made that very clear in Matthew 28.
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He made it clear here, you have to go.
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He says, "Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, even the ends of the earth." You're like, well, that's fine and dandy for the disciples.
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How does Harvest Bible Chapel fulfill this?
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I'm going to tell you how we fulfill this.
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First of all, Jerusalem.
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What was Jerusalem to the disciples?
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That was their backyard, right?
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That was their neighborhood.
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That was their school.
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That was their work.
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That was the people in their immediate circle.
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The way we fulfill that, we encourage you to invite people to church.
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Just invite people to church.
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Your co-workers, your family, your neighbors.
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Invite them to church.
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Like, "Hey, I go to this church that meets at this middle school." You know, people that just love the Lord, authentic - you should come with me sometime.
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It made a huge difference in my life.
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You should come with me.
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That's Jerusalem. That's your backyard.
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Those are the people that the Lord's put in your path.
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But then Jesus said, "In all of Judea and Samaria..." What would Judea and Samaria have been to the disciples?
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That would have been the surrounding areas; the surrounding territories.
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Sharing the Gospel means sometimes you've got to get out of your neighborhood and go to the surrounding areas.
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does Harvest Bible Chapel fulfill that?
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We have every one of our small groups, every quarter is involved in some type of local outreach ministry.
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And we tell our small group leaders, "Look, you find something that your small group is passionate about and go after that." We've had small groups help out with Light of Life, with the Living Ministry, the Homeless Ministry.
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I shared with you earlier, our small group went to the Ronald McDonald house last Sunday and served a meal to the residents there.
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Had tremendous opportunity.
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It wasn't a church event.
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Had tremendous opportunity to pray with people, to hear their story and to come alongside and to encourage them.
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But you see, that's our Judean Samaria, the Pittsburgh area.
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And we go after that through our small group outreach.
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That's why we tell you almost every week, "You need to join a small group, you need to join a small group, you need to join a small group." Why?
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Because that's part of where the mission happens.
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If we're going to fulfill the mission, part of that is being part of a small group.
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And if you keep coming here, you're going to start to be uncomfortable if you haven't joined a small group yet, because you're going to keep hearing it.
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So Jerusalem, you're inviting people in your circle, Judea Samaria, small group outreach, and then Jesus said the end of the earth.
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How do we fulfill that?
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We fulfill that through our partnership with Harvest Bible Fellowship.
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We are a church plant connected with Harvest Bible Fellowship that has 120 or 130 some other Harvest Bible chapels all over the world.
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And the way that we fulfill this ends of the earth part of the mission is through our partnership there.
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So that is how the ends of the earth part of this gets fulfilled.
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Last year we sent one of ours to Moldova to do some ministry there and a couple of months ago we had seven go to Romania to be part of building the training center to train pastors to plant churches there so that the ministry continues.
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So you have the directions get moving in your Jerusalem, in your Judea and Samaria, in the ends of the earth.
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You know, very soon we're going to be talking about taking the next mission trip, whether it's to Romania or whatever.
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We're going to be talking about that and praying about that.
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You need to consider going.
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You're like, "Well, why me? Why not you?" "Why not you?" "Why not you be a witness for Jesus Christ to the ends of the earth?" You have directions get moving.
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And finally for today, you have one opportunity.
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Take it.
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You have one opportunity.
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Take it.
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Look at verses 9-11.
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This is kind of a humorous passage in my opinion.
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It says, "And when He had said these things, as they were looking on, He was lifted up, and a cloud took Him out of their sight.
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And while they were gazing into heaven, as He went, behold, two men stood by them in white robes" - those were angels - "and said, 'Men of Galilee, How do you stand looking into heaven?
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This Jesus who was taken up from you into heaven will come in the same way as you saw Him go into heaven.
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You've got to admit, that's kind of funny, isn't it?
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Here Jesus is talking to them and He's giving their marching orders.
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And right in the middle of His sermon, He's just like...
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He just starts flying.
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And the disciples are just like...
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And your Bible says they're just standing there.
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Did you imagine?
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And He disappears in the clouds, and they're just standing there, and standing there.
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When all of a sudden these two angels show up and they're like, "What are you guys looking at?" Like, dude, Jesus was just here a minute ago.
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I'm serious. He was just here.
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But you see, when the two men said, How do you stand looking into heaven?
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Jesus who was taken from you into heaven will come in the same way.
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What they were saying to the disciples, "Don't worry. He's coming back.
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He's coming back." Okay?
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Jesus will return in the same way that He left, on the clouds and glorified.
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So, I want you to consider your life, your years on this earth, because reality is this, one of two things is going to happen.
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Either you're going to die, or Jesus is going to come back and take you to be with Him.
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The point is you have just a limited amount of time.
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You have some time left on the earth, but you don't know how much time you have left.
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You're going to be around for another day, another week.
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You're going to be around for another 30 years.
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I don't know that and you don't know that.
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The only thing that we can really be sure of is this.
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Now.
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Now is the time to get on board with the mission.
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For those of you that are saying, "You know what, someday I'm going to invite that neighbor to church.
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Someday I'm going to join a small group and get out and do these little local things.
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Someday I'm going to take a mission trip.
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You might not have someday.
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The only time that you can be sure of that you have is right now.
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There's urgency.
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There's urgency.
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We don't need to worry about the timeline.
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We don't need to just stand looking into heaven, wondering when Jesus is going to come back.
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We have one opportunity.
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Let's take it.
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We have the message.
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Let's be confident.
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We have the objective.
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Let's stay focused.
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We have the power.
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Let's be a witness.
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We have the directions.
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Let's get moving.
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Who's with me?
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Let's pray.
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Father in Heaven, Father in Heaven, we thank You in the clarity of Your Word.
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We don't have to wonder what to do or how to do it.
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Jesus made it so clear to the disciples and He made it so clear to us that we receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon us.
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And we are witnesses for Christ in our neighborhoods, our community to the ends of the earth.
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Father, we thank You for the work that we've already seen to that end.
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And we're trusting You for more and for greater things.
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Father, grow this church and so grow our capacity to be an influence for You in the Pittsburgh area and wherever You send us.
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We will go.
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Father, I pray our first priority, would be to just simply allow Your power to be upon us.
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That we wouldn't try to manufacture these things or do these things in our own strength because we can't any more than the disciples could.
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And Jesus is telling us today in the same way that He told the disciples, the ministry happens by the power of the Holy Spirit.
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that we be vessels presented before You that You use to accomplish Your purposes.
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We thank You, Father, for the promise of power that You made in the Old Testament.
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We thank You for the privilege of living at this period of history when we can experience the fulfillment of that promise by the power of Your Holy Spirit.
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In Jesus' name that we pray, Amen.
Small Group Questions (Whole Group):
Read Acts 1:1-11
Why did the disciples ask what they asked in Acts 1:6? Why do you think God wants such a long gap between the first and second coming of Jesus Christ? Why didn't the Father just have the Son establish His kingdom right then and there?
What is the connection between receiving Jesus' power and being Jesus' witnesses? How do you know if you are working in the Holy Spirit's power or working in your own?
Breakout Questions:
Pray for HBC as a church to stay on mission - and specifically, by name, each member of the breakout group to grow as a powerful witness in their personal "Jerusalem".