The Callings To The Generations

Joel 2:28-32

I love this because God is calling out specific generations here. There is a plan and purpose, not just for God’s people - but for the different generations.

We see it happening! When the Spirit falls on God’s people, He works through the generations.

Asbury

God’s literally calling the generations to Him and we will see the Holy Spirit move!

When God speaks to the generations - we have to listen and respond … gods speaking to some young people today

Its happening now.

At Camp Meeting, there was a call for any young people who feel called to ministry and we see this….

Picture / Video of young people at Camp Meeting

God is doing something !!

In Acts, we hear these words echoed.

In Acts 2, the formation of the church, right after the Holy Spirit has fallen on the church and they spoke in tongues.

Acts 2:14–21 NASB 2020

But Peter, taking his stand with the other eleven, raised his voice and declared to them: “Men of Judea and all you who live in Jerusalem, know this, and pay attention to my words. For these people are not drunk, as you assume, since it is only the third hour of the day; but this is what has been spoken through the prophet Joel: ‘And it shall be in the last days,’ God says, ‘That I will pour out My Spirit on all Mankind; and your sons and your daughters will prophesy, and your young men will see visions, And your old men will Have dreams; and Even on My male and female Servants I will pour out My spirit in those days, And they will prophesy. ‘And I will display wonders in the sky above And signs on the earth below, Blood, fire, and vapor of smoke. ‘The sun will be turned into darkness and the moon into blood, Before the great and glorious day of the Lord comes. ‘And it shall be that Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.’

Salvation is offered to EVERYONE, but different gifts are given to the generations.

Anyone who calls on the name will be saved, but the generations are called to different ways the Holy Spirit will work.

Through that, God will work wonders & signs.

This scripture and the Joel scripture talk about these generations and address it as your… He’s speaking to the generations in the last days. Whatever you are in right now…

I want to focus less on the specific gifts and more on the fact that we are called to something different than the generations before and after us. We can learn, and pass on.

The elders have more wisdom that needs passed down.

Tommy Barnett - “what you don’t pass on will die with you. What you don’t teach will die with you.”

So no matter what, pass down wisdom. Don’t hold onto it with shame or greed.

Support the next generation, don’t think just because something is happening in yours, others are irrelevant.

I’m talking to church people now: “Don’t expect the generations above and below you to operate in the same way you do. Don’t think theres something wrong because they aren’t experiencing the moves of God in the same way you are.”

When the new generations come up, we give them wisdom about God’s redemption and restoration, but we don’t get to tell them that they’re wrong for the way the Holy Spirit is moving through them because it looks different than it did for us… i’m not talking about heresey or false doctrine or theology… I’m talking about us turning into close minded, religious people who are more worried about keeping things how they ‘have always been’ instead of pouring into the next generation so they can follow God.

You might have grown up in a church like that - Guess what? Someday, that’s how you’ll be with this.

The goal should not be to teach our kids to “do it right.” It should be to follow God. Follow the Holy Spirit.

I think its more important to teach them what we did wrong than to teach what they need to do right.

We don’t want them making the same mistakes we do. We want them freely operating in the gifts of the Holy Spirit.

Its just by the little things that we can do this.

Applying it to life

Several years ago, we were looking for a house.

Last week, we bought a car

The kids remembered the principal that we taught them. Just the simple, not deep, principal.

They come back from grandparents houses learning all sorts of things.

All we did was teach them a simple lesson.

Pass on a reliance on God.

Your gift might be different from your kid’s gift. And there’s nothing that you can do to change it.

You could hinder it. You could force them to do what you think they should do and push them away from you and God.

Or you could foster that calling.

You might have prophesied, but your kids will dream dreams.

Sports - my kids are learning - am I teaching them? NO! But I’m allowing it to happen by fostering an environment where they can grow in it.

I believe that the scripture gives us an idea of what the generations will look like in the last days so that we can be ready for His Spirit to be poured out and move different in different generations so that we don’t try to “force everyone to be like us.”

We can all look each other from different generations and know what we did wrong and right…

The goal shouldn’t be to fix each other to conform to one another… but to achieve the ultimate goal that this scripture puts forth… “all who call on the Lord shall be saved.”

Don’t search for your gift - search for the Lord. He’ll work through the generations. He’ll do whatever He wants to do through His faithful servants.