Warm Your Heart

Acts 8:14–17 NLT

14 When the apostles in Jerusalem heard that the people of Samaria had accepted God’s message, they sent Peter and John there. 15 As soon as they arrived, they prayed for these new believers to receive the Holy Spirit. 16 The Holy Spirit had not yet come upon any of them, for they had only been baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. 17 Then Peter and John laid their hands upon these believers, and they received the Holy Spirit.

Phillip had just been chosen along with Stephen and 5 other men to take care of the day to day face to face ministry in order for the Apostles to focus on preaching the word....The requirements were to be people who are well respected and are full of the Spirit and wisdom.

It was supposed to be an easy job no preaching just taking care of people…the problems is that when we are spirit filled we don’t always get to choose how we serve. Stephen was preaching and was killed for it…so Phillip should have known better…yet God called him to a place that no one particularly wanted to Go Samaria.

So It was as surprise to everyone it happened! No one expected this to happen because…It might even be that no one really wanted it to happen. Saul of Tarsus (soon to be Paul) did not want it to happen.

In fact he did all he could so that no one would accept Jesus as Messiah. He supervised Phillips friend and co-deacon Stephen’s execution and went all over the country to stamp out anyone who dared to speak the name of Jesus.

But it happened and Phillip the Spirit filled Evangelist one of the 7 appointed with Stephen to take on the everyday one on one ministry to the people preached to Samaria and guess what happened…they believed.

The Spirit filled believer is empowered to do what seems impossible.

Thats how we often know that Holy Spirit is in fact leading…The Holy Spirit is the Holy or sacred Spirit of God with us....Holy Spirit Comes when we believe…but the Holy Spirit controls when we intentionally receive and accept Holy Spirits leading.

The Holy Spirits is what helps us maintain the power and excitement of salvation…It is possible to believe in Jesus without power.

Holy Spirit is the continuation of God with us…the Spirit of God imparts sudden revelation or insight into the heart of God for us and the world.

With the acceptance of the Holy Spirit we are able to allow God to empower us to hear and do the will of God.

With the infilling of the Spirit can move out the fear of change that the enemy uses so successfully.

Holy Spirit is always referred an intimate life transforming presence in the life of a believer or a group of willing believers.

Phillip preaching to the Samaritans and to the Ethiopian eunuch and being supernaturally transported to town farther North to preach salvation to them proves that the Holy Spirit is powerful and is for all who will receive.

This Power and Presence is for you…This Power and Presence is for me....The question is will we receive it and live in it?

As a pastor I can tell you who the Spirit is, how to recieved Holy Spirit but only you can choose to experience The Spirit otherwise it is just manipulation on my part which leads to desiring experience over real leading.

Probably the best example of these truths can be found in John Wesley’s life. John Wesley’s work is credited as being the basis of our Nazarene and Methodist traditions.

John and his brother Charles had gone to America in 1735 to preach to the Native Americans in Georgia, Charles came back only a year later and John returned to England in 1737 a broken man. He had lost in Love and he had not converted on single Native American.

Even though he had believed in Jesus and ministered for decades he was empty discouraged and wondering if he was even a Christian.

Then on May 24, 1738 everything changed. He wrote the following in his journal:

In the evening I went very unwillingly to a society in Aldersgate Street, where one was reading [Martin] Luther's preface to the Epistle to the Romans. About a quarter before nine, while he was describing the change which God works in the heart through faith in Christ, I felt my heart strangely warmed. I felt I did trust in Christ, Christ alone, for salvation; and an assurance was given me that He had taken away my sins, even mine, and saved me from the law of sin and death.

The assurance and the strength he needed was found not becuase it was hidden, but becuase John had been trying desperately to do the work of God in his own human power…and at the end of himself the Holy Spirit reminded him with the strange warming of his heart that the battle belongs to the Lord.

I have to admit that from time to time I fall into the same trap Wesley did. I work, I do , I worry, and I get frustrated when things do not seem to be working out. It is in those times that I am reminded that the results are not up to me. All I can do I obey, and rest in the care of the Holy Spirit.

When I do that two amazing things happen.

1. I am content....I no longer feel the responsibility to move people or circumstance…I am at peace allowing Holy Spirit to move in God’s time.

2. Amazing things happen that I have no control over....God has done miracles not when I felt like I was in control but when I felt like everything was out of control

The tendency of humankind is to control and do....no wonder so many of us struggle in faith and in life.

In times like these if we are to have any hope and a follower of Jesus or as the Church of Jesus Christ we must cry out

Come Holy Spirit We Need You

(James)

What if today you could break free from struggle in you faith and life…What if someone like the disciples was willing to lay hands on you and pray with you to receive the power and presence of the Holy Spirit.

Today the Holy Spirit is here and waiting for you to let him warm your heart. The spirit wants to fill you with purpose....power…contentment…hope....and a future.

You can come to the altar today and we have two or three of us that will lay hands on you if you are comfortable with that and pray with you to receive the Holy Spirit.

Or you can stand up with where you are and with open hands pray this prayer with me.

Wesley’s covenant prayer

I am no longer my own, but yours.

Put me to what you will, place me with whom you will.

Put me to doing, put me to suffering.

Let me be put to work for you or set aside for you,

Praised for you or criticized for you.

Let me be full, let me be empty.

Let me have all things, let me have nothing.

I freely and fully surrender all things to your glory and service.

And now, O wonderful and holy God,

Creator, Redeemer, and Sustainer,

you are mine, and I am yours.

So be it.

And the covenant which I have made on earth,

Let it also be made in heaven.  Amen.

Let’s celebrated the presence of Holy Spirit by receive Communion together.

Receive go to your seats take together and receive the Benediction

May our God, who establishes covenant relationship with those who seek to enter the Kingdom, be with you always. May Jesus Christ, who seals the new covenant with his blood on the cross, bring you peace. May the Holy Spirit guide your life both now and for ever. Go in peace to serve the Lord!