Episode 877 When the Spirit Moves You
[00:00:00] Scott Maderer: [00:00:00] Thanks for joining me on episode 877 of the inspired stewardship podcast.
[00:00:06] Jeff Brown: [00:00:06] I'm Jeff Brown from the read to lead podcast, challenging you to reach true success in business and in life through consistent and intentional reading. One way to be inspired to success is to listen to this, the inspired stewardship podcast with my friend Scott Maderer.
[00:00:25] Scott Maderer: [00:00:25] men of Judea. And all who live in Jerusalem, let this be known to you and listen to what I say, indeed. These are not drunk as you suppose for does only nine o'clock in the morning. No, this is what was spoken through the prophet. Joel. In the last days, it will be God declares that I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy.
[00:00:49] And your young men shall see visions and your old men. Shall dream dreams. Welcome. And thank you for joining us on the inspired stewardship podcast. If you [00:01:00] truly desire to become the person who God wants you to be, then you must learn to use your time, your talent and your treasures for your true calling in the inspired stewardship podcast.
[00:01:11] We'll learn to invest in yourself, invest in others and develop your influence so that you. Can impact the work
[00:01:25] today's spiritual foundation episode about investing in yourself. I talk with you about acts chapter two, verses one through 21. And I then share a sermon. I delivered at Medina valley, United Methodist church on Pentecost Sunday. And I'm sorry about the sound quality of that part of the podcast, but it was captured from a live stream.
[00:01:48] Acts chapter two verses one through 21 begins as this. When the day of Pentecost had come, they were all together in one place. And suddenly from heaven, there came a sound like the [00:02:00] rush of a violent wind, and it filled the entire house where they were sitting divided tongues as a fire appeared among them and a tongue rest out on each of them.
[00:02:10] All of them were filled with the holy spirit and began to speak in other languages as the spirit gave them ability. Now there were devout Jews from every nation under heaven, living in Jerusalem. And at this sound, the crowd gathered and was bewildered because each one heard them speaking in the native language of each.
[00:02:28] Amazed and astonished, they asked are not all these who are speaking Galatians. And how is it that we hear each of us in our own native language? Parthians medias Elamites and residents of Mesopotamia, Judea, and Kapito HSA. Poncho us and Asia for IGA and Pampa, phelia Egypt, and the parts of Libya belonging to the Siberian and visitors from Rome, both Jews and postulates creations and Arabs and our own languages.
[00:02:57] We hear them speaking about God's deeds [00:03:00] of power, all were amazed and perplexed saying to one another, what does this mean? But others sneered and said they were filled with new wine, but Peter standing with the 11 raised his voice and address them. We end up Judea and all who live in Jerusalem. Let this be known to you and listen to what I say, indeed.
[00:03:19] These are not drunk as you suppose for it is only nine o'clock in the morning. No, this is what was spoken through the prophet. Joel. In the last days, it will be God declares that I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy. And your young men shall see visions.
[00:03:36] And your old men shall dream dreams. Even upon my slaves, both men and women in those days, I will pour out my spirit and they shall prophesize. And I will show portals in the heaven above and signs on the earth below blood and fire and smoky mist. The sun shall be turned to darkness and the moon to blood before the coming of the Lord is great.
[00:03:57] And glorious day. Then [00:04:00] everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.
[00:04:06] so as well as the passage from acts the gospel reading, that's actually in the lectionary for this morning. It comes from the pep from John chapter 15. And one part of that passage in verse 13 says when the spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth for, he will not speak on his own, but will speak whatever he hears.
[00:04:32] And he will not be clear to you, the things that are to come. No, I love the passage from John today and the connections between it and the passage from acts speak to me, this idea and acts of the spirit being poured out upon the disciples. This is the passage that you hear every Pentecost Sunday.
[00:05:01] [00:05:00] But I think sometimes when we hear a passage over and over, we begin to lose the ability to pay attention to the words that are used. It just becomes things that we hear and we don't really think about, but think about the words that the writer chooses to use in acts. I'm not sure if you noticed, but it sounds like.
[00:05:27] They're almost struggling to explain what really happened. There's words like a sound like a violent wind there's tongues as a fire, not fire, not wind, but things like that. It's clear that this event that's going on is both unusual. Maybe unique for sure. Almost [00:06:00] beyond description. And yet the spirit that's being talked about is the same spirit that was with God in the beginning, the same spirit that showed up in the burning Bush and spoke to Moses the same spirit that is with us today.
[00:06:23] In fact, this is the same spirit that we are all promised to have given to us. If you think about the passage, I just read from John, as it was mentioned in the opening prayer, this spirit is one of advocacy of truth, but the spirits also want of hearing. And one of speaking. Think again about the passage from acts this unique event this wind and this fire and all of this that is visited upon the disciples.
[00:06:54] Does it stay with the disciples? It leaks out into the [00:07:00] crowd. Think for a minute. And imagine if you are walking down the street of a busy city. Picture that in your mind and not a busy city here in the United States where you'd probably hear English being spoken, but maybe you're walking the streets of Rome or the streets of Paris where there's a ton of sounds around you.
[00:07:22] The sounds of traffic, the sounds of trains, men calling out for their wares. And there is voices, but not just voices. There's voices from a many multitude of places. There's all sorts of languages being spoken. There's people yelling at each other and there's people maybe talking intimately on the corner and out of this cacophony of noise out of all of these different sounds.
[00:07:55] Suddenly you hear a voice [00:08:00] speaking in the language that you recognize. Speaking and you hear a noise as a home. Maybe you hear your own name. Maybe you hear a word you recognize, but there's a voice speaking. The language that you understand. Now I've had the privilege of traveling internationally. I'm not sure if any of you have, but if you have, what that feels like to be in a foreign land where no one speaks your language and suddenly you hear your native language, you immediately turn to it.
[00:08:27] It's like you speak English. Let's have a conversation. I don't know what you do, but let's talk because suddenly you can communicate and think about that. Suddenly these people that are walking through the streets, they hear the language of home. They hear the voice and the sound that they recognize. So just like you would be, they're attracted to it.
[00:08:55] They come over to see what's going on. Who are these people speaking? And the native [00:09:00] language that I hear. And I love the fact that immediately everyone is shocked and basically what they say more or less is who are these country bumpkins that are able to talk our language. That's really what they're saying.
[00:09:14] They're saying who are these guys from out of town that are actually educated enough to speak in the language that I understand? The implication is how is it that people like these people are able to speak in a way that we understand. And in fact, the fact that they turn around and blame it on the alcohol.
[00:09:34] I find funny too, because I don't know about you, but I've yet to see an alcoholic drink that allows me to speak in a foreign light. It might make me sound like I'm speaking in a foreign language, but I won't actually be speaking. In a way that you can understand so that there's clearly some confusion going on.
[00:09:58] And these tongues that are real to [00:10:00] in these times, not a fire and they're not really tongues either, but there's something going on. There's a visible manifestation of an invisible presence. And what did it do? What did this spirit do? As it moved between and among them, I believe it did what the spirit always seeks to the, it began to make connections and began to make connections between the disciples and the community.
[00:10:39] In fact, I believe that the spirit was moving in that moment that we call the birthday of the church. We call the birth of the movement that we call the church. That spirit began to move for one reason. And one reason only to build up the [00:11:00] body of the term. But really it truly, I know we call it the birthplace of the church, but remember the spirit was there before this isn't actually a new event.
[00:11:14] It's just one more time and a long list, but it is really a good example of the church being the church. Doing what the church is called to do, doing what we are called to do. And that is find those around us that are our family, those around us, that come from our home, but not just the place that has the language that we speak, but our family in the word.
[00:11:56] And if you think about it, Even today, [00:12:00] wherever we go, whatever we do, we hear and see and meet people that need to hear the word. They need to feel that comforting feeling of home. They need to feel that someone understands them and they are understood. And in other words, they need to feel the love of Christ.
[00:12:31] There are those who need to be lifted up in justice because there's injustice being perpetrated upon them. The truth is when we talk about the family of the church, it's a diverse family. It's a different family. It's not a body that is in uniformity, [00:13:00] but it is still a body that is called to unity. We don't have to all be alike to all be part of the body of Christ.
[00:13:13] In fact, we're called to be the body of Christ. Not because we agree on all things, but because we agree on one thing. And that is that out of the love of Christ, we are called to move. As the spirit calls us, we are called to move, to make connection. We are called to move, to build the family. We were called to move, to reach out to those that we agree with.
[00:13:48] And even to those that we don't agree with. We're called to lift up each other, but even more, we're called to lift up those that may not even be [00:14:00] here with us today. In other words, we're called to live out the love of Christ, not just in the walls of the church, but out there in the world. Because as that passage from acts today shows us.
[00:14:20] When the spirit moves you, you can't stay quiet. You can't keep your mouth shut. And even if people think it's because you're drunk, you're still shared and called to share and make disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world.
[00:14:46] I hope this word comes to you today and brings you comfort in the name of the father and the son and the holy spirit.
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