Kingdom of God

When I was reading this chapter I felt that God was reminding me of something that he spoke to me a few years ago. When I moved to Chapel Hill I wrestled with various aspects of theology as well as the present culture that surrounds the area including the Church. I was forced to re-examine my life and beliefs about God, calling into question every single idea and assumption. In this time I also recognized the importance in how I read scripture and being aware of the cultural influences that impact own life how that may filter what I read. I recognized that I read the bible from a lens; a perspective of a 20 year old white middle class male who lives in United States. Obviously its much more complex than that, but God in many ways challenged me to read outside of my own culturally filtered lens. God challenged me to look at new ideas and concepts about himself and to set aside what I now believe is bad theology.

What I find interesting about this chapter is that there is a similar concept at work. Peter and the rest of the apostles all made an assumption that salvation was to the Jews and not to the Gentiles, even though the book of Isaiah speaks in numerous chapters about Christ being a light to the Gentiles. There was a cultural mindset that blocked a certain important truth, but luckily they/we have the Holy Spirit to bring revelation. I can’t remember how many times I’ve read something over and over and then one day the Holy Spirit comes and just turns the lights on. I know for me the hardest struggle was humbling myself to the authority and supremacy of scripture. God then showed me how fallible I am and how infallible he is.

-Andrew Kennedy

It’s not a fair fight when you fight with God.

When I read this week’s devotional I began to laugh and the reason why I will explain.  When I was a child my father was an alcoholic and my mother would send us to church each Sunday on a bus and would tell us to pray hard for him.  He often would curse God right in front of us and I remember him even throwing a Bible salesman out the door one Saturday and told him to never bring that book into our house again.  My grandmother would always tells us that “Nothing was impossible for God and that He was able to keep that which he had promised to us”.  Every time we would see her she would remind us of those promises no matter how ugly my father was at that time.  After many years of getting on that bus on Sunday morning God began to move.  I remember it just like it was yesterday.  My dad had been on one of his binges on Saturday night and this Sunday morning my mom just dressed us and sent us to church once again and reminded us to pray for daddy.  When we arrived home dad was still lying there on the couch asleep and that was so unusual for him.  He normally rose early even after a crazy night.  We waited all day on Sunday and he never woke up.  Mom checked his vitals and just waited for him to come alive. Finally Monday morning she called the paramedics to the house and they checked his vitals to see if everything was okay and they simply reported that he must be in an alcoholic coma and that he would come to life in a few hours or for us to call them back.  I remember standing over him and we were only 6,7,8 years old and praying hard for him to wake up.

Monday night about 8:00 p.m. he finally opened his eyes and began to speak but he looked so different.  He thought he had been asleep only a few hours and felt tired.  My mom and us let him know that he had been asleep for two days straight and that we had been praying the entire time.  He had this look on his face like the deer in the headlights.  He tried to explain w hat he had encountered while he was asleep to us.  He began to tell us that he had seen my brother and sister that are in heaven and that they just looked at him while an angel told him that this was his last chance to get his life in order and that he would never see them again.  He spoke of seeing a glimpse of heaven and of hell.  He told us that day that things would be different for all of us from now on.  He began to throw away his cigarettes and tore the bar out of our house with all of the liquor and said that he was done with all of it.  The next Sunday he was in church with us and we were all in awe.  Even my mother was shocked by what God had done during this time he was asleep.  Today he is musician for the Lord and ministers in the prisons in Atlanta.  He has seen many men saved by simply telling this story.

I laugh when I hear anyone fighting with God because I know that God can reach to the highest heights and lowest depths to find someone to save.  He hears our cries and he indeed answers.  I can still see my grandmother laughing to this day about my father and his “Damascus Road” experience.

-Tracy Murillo

The Book of Acts reads like the sequel to a great adventure story. The 1st part being the Book of Luke. The adventure continues with all the thrills, excitement, disappointments and hope. I am always saddened by Stephen’s stoning. Then I get frightened when Luke speaks of the Church being persecuted and scattered. But he follows it up with “Those who had been scattered preached the word wherever they went”. That is so awesome. I don’t face the kind of persecution the 1st believers faced, yet I struggle to speak of the miracles and sacrifice of Christ to non-believers  because I am afraid of being embarrassed. They faced prison, and painful deaths and still spoke the Truth.

In the news, we can often read of cult leaders that convince people they are divine, if not God himself. That’s how I perceive Simon the Sorcerer. No different than a Jim Jones. But when Phillip shows up performing true miracles and not “slight of hand” magic, the people of Samaria see whom the one true God is. This brings me back to my earlier point. Samaria had a leader. They had a seudo god. They could have easily rejected Phillip and killed him. Past experience would have made Phillip very aware to this fact. But, he spoke to the crowds, healed people and cast out evil spirits anyway bringing the people to believe and be baptized.

So why am I so frightened of sharing the love and miracles of Christ? Society tells me it is not okay and that “spirituality” is a very personal thing, not to be shared. I need to reject those lies. My wife is not saved. My two brothers and my mother are not saved. I don’t take responsibility for their salvation, but it sure would be nice to not feel embarrassed when I want to share how much Christ has done in my life or the great sacrifice Christ did for my life. The Bible gives me hope.

-Joe Novara

When suffering comes unexpectedly, we have a choice- to glorify God by trusting Him and receiving grace to endure, or to become bitter and stunted as people. When I was 22 years old my mother died after a long battle with cancer.  Two years later I was pregnant and I lost a baby at 23 weeks along of unknown causes. The next year, after a very difficult 8 month-long pregnancy, I delivered stillborn conjoined, or Siamese twins.  My response to these tragedies would be the foundation for the rest of my life, and at times it felt like a life and death struggle. In these very difficult circumstances, when I couldn’t hope in a certain outcome, I had to fall back to hope in God alone, in who I knew Him to be for me- loving, attentive, and good. As Job declared in his suffering, I set my heart to say,  “Though He slay me, I will hope in Him.” (Job 13:15).

God never plays according to our rules, and often offends our sense of fairness or “niceness”. In chapter 7 of Acts, His godly servant, Stephen, was surrounded by an angry mob and stoned to death. God’s ways are often offensive to our natural understanding because we judge by what we know and what we see. The stoning of Stephen appeared to be a brutal senseless tragedy, snuffing out a man on the verge of his ministry and calling. From God’s perspective, it was a glorious homecoming for a beloved son of God that would usher in a season of revival springing out of his martyrdom. The spectators that focused on the brutality, hate and horror of the incident without faith would ask,”Where was God?” However, Stephen, full of faith and the Holy Spirit, saw his circumstances from God’s perspective, and the world of hate and pain grew strangely dim, in the light of the heavenly glory of God the Father and God the Son welcoming him.

When we are in painful circumstances, we can purpose to believe that God is good, God is in control, and God loves me. It is our faithful clinging to God in dark times that causes our faith to shine like gold. Because of his faith, Stephen was given a vision of Jesus standing up to welcome him into heaven. May we be faithful when tested, believing in His goodness, power and love, no matter how out of control and scary things seem to be. His presence can comfort and strengthen us in any situation to be overcomers with a heavenly perspective, just like Stephen. I won’t know all the reasons I had such a string of tragedies in my early 20s, but I know that God became so real and close to me that I am forever a changed person (with four healthy children!). When I get to heaven I will fully understand, but till then I know that God is faithful, loving, and good.

-Susy Holloway

These seven verses from Acts had a tremendous impact on me.  In fact, one might say they touched me a few days too late: but not too late to provide some excellent guidance for the future, and to shed some Biblical light on a very tense situation I encountered just four days ago.

The Twelve made a sensible decision in delegating the job of feeding the Grecian Jewish widows, designating Stephen plus six pals to that important, if perhaps menial, job.  That strikes me as enlightened leadership, addressing the urgent problem at hand, while freeing up the Twelve to “give (their) attention to prayer and ministry of the word” and focus on promoting the Kingdom.

But sometimes, a high-growth, high-pressure scenario which the early Church faced will force individuals and groups into multi-tasking. This can lead to an erosion of performance and results, including loss of focus on the ‘mission critical’ task.  Personally, I experienced extreme discomfort this week in trying to deal with growth in our training program, while delivering a one-week course for senior airport managers in Atlanta.  I team-teach with my boss, the course leader, who is also a believer.  We have delivered this course together six times previously, pretty well, I thought.

Our training program is growing fast and our business plan is quite aggressive, calling for us to offer our entry course four more times this year.  In this tough business climate, training budgets are often the first line item cut by airport operators. So the boss and I, who also must market these courses, are working long hours to attract new recruits.  So while he addressed the class (we work in two hour shifts), I was quietly working on my laptop in the back of the classroom, promoting upcoming courses in Dubrovnik and Seoul.  I was paying attention to his delivery, but with perhaps 30% concentration. But he’d noticed my preoccupation with my laptop and something had snapped in him. Immediately after the class he confronted me, saying I had “abandoned” the concept of ‘team-teaching’.  This really hurt because I was actually “giving my attention to the broader program ministry”, to paraphrase the Twelve’s strategy in Acts.  In this morning’s message, Pastor Kendrick referred to a meeting of staff at Glacier National Park, where authority took over to correct a bad situation.  My experience was a lot like that one but much more personal:  I could see the veins popping in my boss’  neck as he reached a boil.

I handle confrontation badly and I can be quite thin-skinned and stubborn.  I felt combative, queasy, and a bit guilty all at once.  But I did not rebut his accusations.  My boss then said his greatest fear was that during the vital “class role play” the following day, I “would not contribute” and there would be “long silences”.  This is strange, because I’d handled the role play fine before (or so I’d thought.)  It turns out he thought I’d been too quiet  and passive!

So I was jolted back to the immediate task of delivering the course.  I slept poorly that night and awoke at about 4 a.m., immediately grabbing a note pad and jotting down 15 ideas for questions to facilitate the role-play.  The Lord showed up for me in the morning darkness, calming my heart and mind. I believe the notes I jotted down so effortlessly were directed by His hand.  The next day, the boss asked me to chair the role-play, and he took a minor supporting role.  All went really well. When we finished, he pointed to my long list of ideas and said simply: “don’t lose that for the next class”.  We had a Christian guy-hug and I began to recover from the sting of the criticism.

I think many of us, reading this passage in Acts, might reflect on our own lives and jobs and say, much like I did:  “I don’t have anyone to delegate this to!” I felt stretched, confused and disconnected about my priorities last week. That’s when I needed to look to the Lord for the discernment as to when to feed the Grecian Jews, and when to “give (my) attention to the ministry of the word”.  Whichever path I choose in the future, it merits my full attention and commitment.  Who are we when no one is looking?  Are we working at our laptops at the back of the room, or concentrating fully and devoting our minds and hearts to ensure our current task is accomplished with excellence, energy and Christian love.

-Paul Behnke

Four months ago, I started working as a registered nurse at NC Children’s Hospital. For three of those months I have off and on cared for a patient that has captured my heart. He was a perfectly healthy seven year old boy with no past medical history admitted for unexplained changes in his neurological status. Ninety days later you could compare what he is going through to end stage Alzheimer’s disease. For a period, I was angry at God. I stretched out my hands on him in prayer begging God for complete healing, to see the miraculous wonders that I know He is capable of doing. However, I have thus far seen a miracle, but have come to realize that my will is not always the will of God and that just maybe he is using this patient for a different purpose.

Even though my prayers have not been answered the way I would like, God has used this patient in my life to bring me closer to Him and allow me to step out bolder in my walk with God. A year ago, I never would have had the courage to lay my hands in prayer publicly on a patient. Prayer has always been a more personal matter for me and definitely not something I would do in front of people I barely know. I am much more familiar and comfortable with prayer over my loved one or with close friends, but I have reached a new place where I want my prayers to extend to my patients and their families that are not so familiar to me. I do not want to be part of the crowd that is restrained by their own personal fear or intimidation that they miss out on a great opportunity like those in Acts 5:12-13. I think it is very easy to get stuck in “Solomon’s Porch” due to familiarity. I used to be stuck there myself. While I have a long way to go, I feel that personal boldness like the apostles in Acts will help me to one day see great miracles that I have yet to see.

-Rebecca Emerson

Jeremy “smiled, actually a sly little chuckle’ when I told him . . . my assigned section of Acts could hardly be more challenging to me!  If you know me you will know that the name Pollyanna has been referred to many times.  One time my niece sent me a pair of rose colored glasses as she noted that this is how I seem to view the world.  Yet the Ananias and Sapphira section of Acts makes me dig pretty deep to cast such a positive spin!

My first inclination was to fault – - – .  Take Joses/Joseph/Barnabas selling his land.  One commentary noted that he had a field suitable for growing crops.  Aha!  My response is that very likely it would have been more helpful had he grown crops and dispensed them or sold them as a continual means of supply for the church.  However, to get back on track . . . that was NOT the issue here at all.  Secondly, I began to question Peter’s handling of the situation.  Could he not have ‘called him out’ when Ananias brought in PART of the sale money for the land and extend the opportunity of reemption?  When Ananias did fall dead, his body at least got wrapped.  My next contention was when Sapphira came in — again I took issue with Peter who showed her no sympathy that her husband has just keeled over, let her go right down the same path Ananias had taken AND when she drops over they simply haul her out  . . . not even the decency of wrapping her body!   Whoa, whoa, whoa I remind myself.  Where are you going, Kathryn!!?

Yes, I do realize that this was a measure of unity and of being ‘of one heart and one soul’.  Barnabas displayed this when he sold land and brought the money he received and laid it at the apostles’ feet.  There seemed to have been a corporate agreement of communality, yet it is not apparent to me that members were forced to sell and give.  This came from the sense of good for the whole and doing what could best achieve that.  My Bible starts chapter 5 with a very big BUT.  This sends a very big flag, rings a loud alarm indeed.  As Barnabas sold land, so did Ananias and Sapphira sell.  H-o-w-e-v-e-r, this couple knowingly held back a part of the proceeds; Ananias brought part and laid it at the apostles’ feet.  Peter saw through it all “You have not lied to men but to God”.  Wow!

This was a community said to be of one accord.  Ananias and Sapphira had strayed far from that heart.  To them, the land, the money from the land, was a golden calf.  How many golden calves do we have?  They deceived themselves, they deceived the community, and they attempted to deceive God!  Where there is deception can there be true intimacy?   Sam Storms reminds us that in seeking intimacy with God one pitfall is ‘to fail to come to Him on His terms’.  The example of Ananias and Sapphira serve as a reminder that there is no sin that may be impossible for any one to commit and there but for the Grace of God ‘go we’.  It reminds me too of the awesome power of one accord, the awesome power of communal spirit, and the Grace that allows us redemption again and again.  This is an awesome God and for His Grace, I am grateful.

-Kathryn Carder

These scriptures are an affirmation to me that God gives us the power
through his Holy Spirit to do and say what we alone are powerless to do.  I
am accountable to God and what He asks of me.  It is through His power and
direction that I can do His will and glorify Him.

It is not for me to concern myself with saying or doing the wrong things as
long as I seek Him for my direction.  He is there for me and for all of us.
No matter what trials are ahead, I am delivered though the victory of Jesus
Christ’s resurrection and love.

There will always be others who will deny Jesus, no matter what
miracles/power they may see or hear. In standing for God and fighting evil,
it would be advantageous for me to become more familiar with the scriptures.

There will continue to be confrontations from the enemy and I can stand firm
on the word of God.  To be obedient to God, I must know His Word.  Jesus and
his apostles would cite the scriptures during times of strife.

All of us, as Christians, must endeavor to persevere in spreading the Gospel
with boldness. Jesus is the Christ and God will continue to perform wonders
and miracles through our faith and belief in proclaiming the good news.  It
is especially important to hold on to these truths as we seek more believers
into His fold.  We all can be a part of a supernatural Kingdom expression if
we allow the Holy Spirit to indwell in us.  He is the ONE and ONLY
deliverer.  He is the God of our salvation.  Let’s serve Him and allow
miracles to happen.

-Becky Link

It’s funny how often in the Gospels we see miracles played out as the people watch in shocked amazement. It happens all the time and it’s almost as though the people don’t expect miracles to happen. It’s the same way in Acts 3 when Peter heals the beggar: the people run to gather and are completely astonished by the healing.

I was thinking about this concept in a slightly judgmental manner when I realized that I do the same thing today. I realized that I tend to be surprised when a modern day miracle occurs in the same way that the people in the bible were shocked when Peter healed the beggar. I forget that God is so powerful and that he does performs miracles all the time. I just forget to look for them.

When Pastor Vinar told us to ask God for something big last January, I began to pray in earnest for my grandfather’s salvation. He is not a young man and has had treatments for cancer for a few years now. He is moving swiftly on his way to judgment day and it was my biggest prayer that Jesus would recognize him when he got there. I made praying for him a part of my daily prayer time and tried to remember to pray for him several times a day. But as the weeks went by with no change in my grandfather’s heart, I began to question if my prayers were having any affect at all and I gradually stopped praying for his salvation every day. I still prayed whenever I thought about him but it had lost its priority status in my life. A few months ago, my father was able to lead my grandfather to Christ and I was truly shocked and amazed. I had given up because his salvation had not happened on my timetable but instead had occurred in God’s time. As I remember this story it reminds me to really look for the miracles that God performs every day and to realize that he is fully in control at all times. I am reminded that he does everything for a purpose and everything occurs in His perfect timing.

-Meghan Gay

3000 people were added to the church in one day and then they devoted themselves to; the teaching of the 11 men who had spent three years walking and talking to Jesus, meeting with each other in homes to encourage and pray for each other and eating many of their meals together, sharing their food so no one would go without.

When I read this and contemplate what it must have been like I think about my own conversion experience and how full of joy and faith I was and how aware I was of the Holy Spirit’s presence in my life. I was in love – in love with Jesus. The early church was made up of over 3000 (they were adding to their number daily) men, women and children caught in that grip of first love.

Interestingly, as they fed on the teaching, fellowship, sharing of resources and prayer they experienced a deep sense of awe, saw many miracles, were able to join together in worship and in fellowship that was incredibly rich and deep and resulted in being well thought of by their community and a drawing of more people to salvation.

In the book of Revelations (ch. 2, vs. 4,5) Jesus exhorts the church in Ephesus to return to him as their first love and to the love of each other so they might do the works that they did at first. If Jesus himself urges the church (with consequences if they don’t) to return to first love it is a prayer that He loves to answer.

Lord, refresh our hearts, help us to desire you with the same intensity of passion that we did at first, rekindle your first love in our hearts!

-Shery Armstrong