Sermons on Holy Spirit

The Discernment of God’s Direction

How can we know God’s will for our lives? That is a question that believers have been asking for centuries! It is a question that I grappled with as a teenager; and a question that I still seek answers to today. We never outgrow the need for seeking God’s will. In this study, we find Paul and Barnabas ready to set sail on yet another missionary journey, but conflicted over some of the details of the journey. In spite of human failings, God’s will was accomplished in and through these men.

DEPENDENCY: Not Always a Bad Thing

In the last days of his life, the Apostle Paul found himself in a dreadful situation—imprisoned and deserted by almost all of his companions. It was in these circumstances that Paul wrote to his ‘beloved’ son in the ministry, Timothy. In spite of his own depressing circumstances, Paul sought to encourage and instruct his disciple—and every disciple of Christ since—to not be fearful but to be ever-increasing in his dependence on the Holy Spirit of God in every aspect of his life.

The Leadership of God’s People

When thinking about the ways in which God leads His people, R. Kent Hughes said, “God can use unhappy, perplexing failures to bring fresh purpose and direction to our lives… Even when we are at fault, God will use our failures to bring greater blessing… God will lead us according to his own perfect plan for our lives and ministries. We must be careful not to box God in by our prior experience. The most important thing by far is our attitude… We need to yield to his caring hand.”

The Shifting Focus of the Gospel

As we look at a long section of Scripture today, we will see how that God is methodically moving Peter to see that the gospel is for everyone—not just the Jewish elite. In His sovereignty, God moves Peter from one situation to the next, opening his heart to ‘the Nations’ and releasing a lifetime of bigotry and prejudice. It is sometimes hard for us to imagine the Apostle Peter as bigoted or prejudiced, but we must consider who he is within his cultural context and the Jewish people looked down upon the Gentiles. In this passage, God uses a series of events to open Peter’s eyes to the simple truth that the gospel “is the power of God at work, saving everyone who believes—the Jew first and also the Gentile” (Romans 1:16b). So it is time for us to ask, “When will we get beyond our prejudice, our misconceptions and our elitism and be willing to seek after all people with the gospel?”