Sermon Tone Analysis

Recap

Jesus is calling his children, his church to a place of living unhindered.

A place of freedom.

To ditch their graveclothes or those things from their pasts and move forward into His future.

To be free to worship him

To be free to walk in His Way

Being Salt and Light in the places where we live and work and play so that others might experience that same freedom in their lives.

We spent several weeks looking at the way that Jesus told us to live free.

The Beatitudes

A progression of the spiritual life.

We have to see, first, who we really are:

We are spiritually impoverished without Him

Our status outside of Him is sorrowful

This leads us to his goodness that we can’t buy or deserve

Along with that we discover great joy in his forgiveness

We experience what it means to be wanted and loved and our spirit becomes meek and willing in the light of who He is.

As this takes place, we develop a strong hunger in our hearts - we want more.

We want to give out from what we have experienced and Jesus continues to pour greater measures into our lives.

This mercy works within us a pure heart - a heart that seeks to glorify God

A sanctified heart

A regenerated heart by the power of God’s Holy spirit

Which puts within us a desire to be peaceful people

To live at peace with God and all men

And to be people who bring peace into chaotic situations

And soon we begin to look like and act like the children of God.

We become like his own son, Jesus Christ

We think like him

We love like him

and we are about our Father’s business like him

And then last week we looked it means to become like our Heavenly Father.

It means we open our lives up for attack.

It means persecution

yet in the midst of that to be blessed

Understanding that it’s not about us at all, but about the Kingdom of Heaven

Today I want to continue that thought of doing the business of the Kingdom by speaking this message entitled “ “

Turn with me to

Acts 1:1-26

The church unhindered

Acts 1:

Terrorism hinders

September 11, 2001

Terrorists strike out at the might of our country - our bank and trading system and our government

To strike fear in the hearts of Americans

It did the opposite - It brought us together, it gave us the anger and resolution to defeat the evil that was against us

That’ s the way Terrorists work - fear

Jesus on the cross - satan’s attempt to disband the church

chop off the head and the body will slump and die

Again, that’s not what happened - yes the disciples run and hide for a bit

But here in we see the reorganization into something powerful that will change their world at that time.

The church receives their call in the death of their Lord and Savior

They react to that call and go forth

In the midst of great persecution and death they travel to the ends of their earth preaching him and living for him

And you and I are gathered in this building today because of their bravery and their sacrifice

And you and I should be doing the same.

I want to talk today, in this message called “Freedom of Speech,” about being Unhindered to witness.

We see in Acts chapter 1 that the church was founded for one reason - to be a witness for their Lord and savior Jesus Christ

This is what we are called to do brothers and sisters

It’s our primary reason for being here today

And if you are visiting today, than we hope that you are sensing one things - That we love Jesus and that we are doing what we are doing today to celebrate what He has done in our lives and to let you know that He is real, That He is Alive, That He loves you and because of that, so do we

Be My Witnesses

And so Jesus says, “Be My Witnesses”

In the midst of situations and circumstances - Be My Witnesses

In the midst of persecution - Be My witnesses

In the midst of Political correctness - Be My Witnesses

In everything that you do - Be My Witnesses

And all the time, the enemy is coming against us.

He is trying to strike terror in our hearts and keep us from living and witnessing for Christ.

He is trying to keep us busy so we cannot witness for Christ

He is trying to get us to compromise so that we won’t be a witness for Christ

You know another weird trap of his?

He tries to keep us together so we will not witness for Christ.

You see, as we look at the church, we see that they were dispersed by the death of Christ for a reason

The persecution that followed sent them even further

And all the time they are living for Christ, being examples of his love and mercy in the world that they are sent out to.

But I want you to know why the enemy cannot stop this.

I want you to know why you need to be about being a witness for Jesus Christ.

And how you know that you can be successful in it.

4 Things:

Jesus chose you to be His Witness

You Were Chosen to Be a Witness

We see in verse 2 that the Apostles were chosen

The Word Apostles = Greek Word Apostolos = Envoy, ambassador, or messenger commissioned to carry out the instructions of the commissioning agent.

So if you are a believer in Christ, If you have committed your life to Him and accepted him as your savior

Then you are a messenger or a witness for Jesus Christ.

He has picked you and chosen you to be such.

And still many might say, but we picked him.

We came to him.

We came to the altar, we bowed to our knees, we said the prayer of acceptance and we make the declaration of faith in Him today.

That is true, but you could not have done that without His Holy Spirit calling to you.

John 6:

Three baptisms:

John in water

Holy Spirit into Jesus

And then

So Jesus has chosen you and called you.

You are not here today because of your own choice, but there was a gentle persuasion of the Holy Spirit that led you here today.

Thank God for that.

We also read in

There you have it.

If you still aren’t believing what I’m saying, Jesus says it himself.