Latest / Breakthrough Church Podcast / Clothed With Power
Transcript
- Breakthrough Church: Hey, what's up everybody? Welcome back to another episode of the Breakthrough Church podcast. Excited to be with you. I know I was out last week, ⁓ but here I am with ⁓ just some encouragements and just some things that are on my mind ⁓ this week. ⁓ it's ⁓ May twenty eighth as I'm recording this, and ⁓ Breakthrough Church is in the midst of a ten day fast. I invited everybody into that and everybody's engaging. ⁓ well, not not everybody's in engaging, probably, but ⁓ We I invited people to engage in ways that they f they felt they were able to and they could in their season of life. And so in some form or fashion, the prayer is that a a lot of our church body will be fasting and ⁓ just consecrating themselves onto getting a word from the Lord and renewal in our spirits, fresh hunger for the presence of God. And ⁓ I just I think it'll be kind of life changing for many of us. But ⁓ so you can be praying for us about that. But I wanted to share something that's always been on my heart since the beginning of this journey to planting breakthrough, kind of going back to the roots. I remember some of the first episodes that I recorded, ⁓ a lot of them were about the kingdom of God and seeing the Holy Spirit and the gifts of the Spirit be manifested in the people of God for the work of the kingdom. And on my mind right now is ⁓ just we'll just dive right in. So at the end of Jesus' ministry on earth, ⁓ he dies, resurrects from the grave. And and visits his disciples for forty days, teaching them about the kingdom of God, it says in in Acts chapter one. And in Matthew 28, we get the great commission. We all know this if you follow Jesus for any amount of time. ⁓ but the great commission is ⁓ go therefore and make disciples of all nations. Well, actually, before that, he says, All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son. And the Holy Spirit, teaching them to obey all that I've commanded you, and behold, I am with you until the very end of the age. So you have this this ⁓ this promise of authority and this promise of presence ⁓ on on the the the ends of this command to go make disciples and baptize them and teach them. ⁓ that's great, and I and I love that, but but at the same time, Jesus doesn't give a lot of clarity on how they're to go about doing this. Because it's assumed that they're to go about doing it the very way that Jesus has just trained them to do it for the last three years. And so you see that at the very beginning of Acts. You actually go into Acts chapter one, two, and three and four, and you see, well, I mean the entire book, but at the very beginning of Acts, you see them begin to do this just like Jesus did. You're seeing the ministry of Jesus being extended through his disciples, his twelve specifically. And so ⁓ what you see is At the beginning of Acts, ⁓ Jesus tells them, Hey, don't leave Jerusalem, wait until the promise of the Father ⁓ comes upon you. And in Luke, he talks about that as being clothed with power from on high. So this promise of the Father, what he would say, what John the Baptist would say is the baptism of the Holy Spirit is a clothing of power to fulfill the mission that Jesus had given them to go and make disciples, baptizing them and teaching them. ⁓ so so they go and they wait in Jerusalem, they pray for 10 days. ⁓ they're of one accord in prayer, they're waiting in the upper room, they're praying. and after 10 days, boom, Holy Spirit comes. And the Holy Spirit, this is new, this is the democratization of the Holy Spirit. He comes in the Old Testament, he would come and go as needed, but in this moment, he comes and resides in the body of Jesus, that is his church, the 12 disciples, and really the 120 that are. gathered in the upper room. So ⁓ it's this amazing moment. Spirits poured out on power. They're not in not only in and dwell with the spirit, but now they're filled with the Holy Spirit's power. And they begin speaking in tongues and acting like drunk people because there were people there that were accusing them of being drunk. Now I don't know about you, but ⁓ if I if what happened to them happened to me, you probably wouldn't have assumed I was drunk. When they got Baptized in the Holy Spirit, what happened was they began to speak in tongues, languages that they did not know at the time, but the Holy Spirit supernaturally empowered them to speak. So if that happened to me, if all of a sudden I spoke Mandarin and you knew I didn't speak Mandarin, you would probably not assume I was drunk. You would probably assume I was a genius, ⁓ or I've already known this, or something supernatural was happening. But these people assume. That the disciples are drunk because there's something going on outside of just them speaking in tongues that made them think that they were drunk. They were probably loud, inebriated, uninhibited. ⁓ maybe some of them had fallen down. Regardless, here's the point: that power fell on those disciples. And it wasn't just so that they could have an amazing moment in the upper room with God in his presence. It was to get them out of the room to go hit the streets to To do what Jesus had been doing, to share the gospel of the kingdom and to do signs and wonders to affirm the message of the kingdom. And so they go and they do that immediately. ⁓ the first time that we see this really happen is when Peter and John are going to the temple to pray. Apparently the disciples had continued rhythms of prayer in the temple, despite those very people overseeing the temple having killed their Messiah only fifty days prior to. so they're they're going. To the temple to pray, and they see a lame beggar ⁓ outside of the temple. ⁓ the implication is that this guy's been there for a very long time. Jesus would have seen this guy, but didn't heal him, and now it's the disciples' turn to heal him. So they're looking, the the lame beggar is looking at them ⁓ and ⁓ is wanting alms, wanting money. ⁓ and Peter and John look at them and like, well, we don't have money, but what we do have, we give you. In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, stand up and walk. And he gets up and walks and not only walks, but begins leaping and praising God and attaches himself to them. So as they go into the temple, they have this man who was just lame, leaping up and down, celebrating and basically worshiping Peter and John. And Peter and John are like, No, no, no, no, don't worship us. It wasn't us that healed you. It was Jesus and faith in his name that healed you. And they get in trouble because of this. ⁓ people c ⁓ the disciples, or I'm sorry, the Pharisees, the religious leaders come and they put ⁓ in jail, say, Hey, stop doing this. And Hey, th they're like, hey, we can't, we can't stop doing this. We can't deny what we've seen and heard. And the discipl the Pharisees, they see that they they're uneducated men and that they had been with Jesus and they basically say, All right, well, no more, and they leave him alone. And the disciples go back to the other disciples and they rejoice that they were able to suffer for the sake of the name of Jesus. I think that they s they were rejoiced because they suffered for his name, because they had witnessed firsthand his suffering. ⁓ and I think at this point they loved him so much that they would be willing to do anything just to be near him. And there's something about suffering that draws us near to the Lord. ⁓ and so they're here's this here's a long story short. Let's zoom out. They're following in the footsteps of Jesus in ministry. They're hitting the streets, sharing the gospel of the kingdom, praying for people to be saved, ⁓ praying for people to be healed and delivered of chronic illness. I mean, the the boldness, right? If you were to walk up to somebody in a wheelchair, how much boldness Would it take for you to grab them by the hand and say, In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, stand up and walk? This is crazy stuff, guys, but it's exactly what Jesus had trained them to do. They were going and making disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and and teaching them to obey all that He had commanded. You see this continue ⁓ throughout the rest of the book of Acts, not just in Jerusalem. But they eventually go to Samaria, Judea, and to the quote ends of the earth as Paul goes to Rome and other places. And so one of the things that I was really captivated by early on in my walk with the Lord, ⁓ really early on in this church planting process, ⁓ it was before I even knew church planting was going to be on the radar for me. ⁓ it was ⁓ this idea of like wanting to see the gospel go forth outside of the church in such a way. That there were great displays of power by the Holy Spirit to affirm the message that the kingdom of heaven is at he is at hand. And I I'm even feeling captivated by it right now as I'm sharing this with you. And I'm feeling a fire in my stomach right now for this. Like, man. That's how Jesus trained his disciples. And that's how his disciples went and carried it on. And for the history of the church, evangelism. was something that was done on the streets. It was, yeah, we're building, we're building the church of of Jesus Christ and and and to maturity. We're teaching them to obey all that God's commanded, but there has to be this regular rhythm of hitting the streets and praying for people and sharing the gospel and seeing the Lord move in signs and wonders. ⁓ and and so the I I want to encourage you that the gospel of Jesus was never meant to stay within the four walls of the church. It is in there. It's very much in there. And it should be. We should w when we gather as the saints, the gospel should be preached every week. The beauty of Jesus, his death and resurrection. The anointing of the Spirit falls on those messages. And it's like Christ it's like Paul Christ crucified, that's all he preached, and the Holy Spirit came and there's demonstrations of power and signs and wonders within the within the church as well, but also outside of the church. The gospel of the kingdom dictates we must get outside the church to share the gospel with people because that's how the kingdom is going to advance. And ⁓ so I just want to encourage you if you found yourself, just like I have so many times, even just this week, if you found yourself insulated inside, focusing on things that matter, like prayer and Bible study, or even just taking care of the people in your house, that's amazing. Praise God. I want to encourage you, find some way to get outside of your house, outside of your church, and go tell someone that God loves them and pray for them. Just go lay your hand on someone and just pray for them and say, God loves you. I want to bless you in prayer. Can I pray for you? Don't worry about being rejected. They're probably not, but if they do, go on to the next person. There's no harm, no foul. ⁓ but I just have this vision of the kingdom of God and the people of God advancing the kingdom outside of the walls of the church. It takes boldness from the Holy Spirit and it takes a display of power by the Holy Spirit. We can't do this without the Holy Spirit. ⁓ so I just want to encourage you with that. And then I also want to invite you to two dates that are gonna be opportunities to do this in real time with Breakthrough Church. So I don't know if any of you know this, but the World Cup is gonna be in three countries this summer in June. There's gonna it's gonna be in Canada, United States of America, and Mexico. And ⁓ and there are going to be 104 matches in the World Cup this year. In the United States, and specifically in Dallas, there are nine. Nine matches, nine World Cup matches are taking place in the Dallas Metroplex in June. I didn't know much about the World Cup until I started hearing about this. but there are there is an estimated like Two-thirds of the world's population will have some sort of interaction with the World Cup matches this year. And and and so that's like four billion, four point five billion people that are gonna have some sort of touch with the World Cup this summer. I also didn't know this that every World Cup is treated with resources and television and all that. It's treated as if it's a its own Super Bowl. So there's gonna be nine Super Bowls happening in June in Dallas, and we have an opportunity to spread the gospel of the kingdom to the nations in our own backyard. What if the story that's told this June isn't the story of how this team won the World Cup in this fashion? But the story was actually the one of the gospel of the kingdom spreading and taking over. And Jesus winning and Jesus being celebrated more than any one player or any one team. That's the heart behind this huge initiative called Jesus Saves. Jesus Saves is being ⁓ spearheaded by this nonprofit called Time to Revive. And their job is to they equip and train Christians and churches to do outreaches like this in their local church. And ⁓ and and breakthrough churches joining Time to Revive and hundreds of other churches in 16 other cities, ⁓ as we seek to be a movement of evangelism and outreach among the nations in our own backyard. ⁓ so here's what this looks like really practically. There are matches happening at Arlington Stadium. Okay. ⁓ there are matches hap there, I I have to look at the exact ⁓ the ex ⁓ the exact details again, but I'm I'm planting a seed here. But in June, ⁓ these matches are going to be played in Dallas at ATT Stadium. Maybe there's another place. I know there's a watch party in Fair Park as well. ⁓ so so here's the vision. It's a it's committing a whole day of basically being a missionary. Come be a missionary for one day. Experience what it's like to be a missionary in our own backyard. So you can expect to commit eight hours on these two dates, June 17th, And June 27th. Those are the two dates Breakthrough Church is joining. There's many other dates. There's nine matches total. And you can pick any of them. The but Breakthrough has chosen to participate in June 17th and June 27th. And June 17th, there's a match at 3 PM ⁓ at at at Arlington Stadium. And ⁓ the matches at 3 PM, which means that you can plan on committing the four hours before that and the four hours after that. Let me give you the quick rundown. At eleven AM that day, four hours before the match, everybody that's gonna go share the gospel in that and around that stadium is going to go to the upper room church in Dallas. And during that time, we're gonna worship and get in the spirit and be equipped in how to do evangelism on the street in a really approachable, relational, and spirit filled way. They're going to train us, and then we are collectively, everybody in that building is gonna hop on public transportation and we're gonna head to the stadium. And we're gonna hopefully get there two an hour to two before the match so that as people arrive, people from Argentina, people from England, people from Brazil, Mexico, Croatia, whatever the match might be, those people as they're arriving and and locals, as they're arriving, we are there to receive them and to pray for them, share the gospel with them and see them receive Jesus as their Lord and Savior. ⁓ and then we're gonna do that throughout. the the match and then maybe a little bit after the match and then we'll head back to the upper room after that on public transportation ⁓ and testify and be able to share stories of how God met people as we share the gospel with them at the World Cup match. ⁓ and then we'll be done somewhere around ⁓ seven o'clock and then you'll be able to head home. ⁓ so that's June seventeenth. ⁓ June twenty seventh, the game get this the game is at nine PM And we're doing it, baby. We're gonna go to upper room at 5 p.m. and we're gonna go share the gospel at nine p around the the stadiums from about seven to ten. We're gonna go back to upper room, testify, and get back in our beds probably around one or two in the morning. It's gonna be glorious and very difficult, but I wanna see signs and wonders under the lights, baby. I want to see God meet people and heal them on the spot as we share the gospel of the kingdom. I just I'm believing God for hundreds and thousands. To be saved through this massive evangelistic effort. All props a time to revive Kyle Martin and their team over there. I'm very excited for what they're doing ⁓ and can't wait for us to participate. So here's what I need you to do. If you want to participate, please reach out to me. 214-769-5228. Give me a text, your name and and which date you want to be in on. And we'll try our best to orchestrate this and coordinate it. It's going to be pretty simple, but ⁓ maybe we'll carpool. But if you want to be a participant in this, come with us. Text me. Let me know that you're going to come. If you want to participate in literally the fundamental mission Jesus put his disciples on to make disciples of all nations, if you want to participate in that, ⁓ please reach out to me. I'm very excited. I believe there's going to be people that are saved and healed and delivered. I believe Jesus is so excited for this and he's going to pour out his spirit. It's going to be amazing. So Again, it's a way to participate in what Peter and John participated outside the temple when they healed the lime b Lyme b Lime Lyme, the lame beggar. ⁓ and what ⁓ you know, ph Philip got to do with the Ethiopian eunuch when the Holy Spirit led him to go share the gospel with him as he was reading the scriptures. We're gonna see God move. We're gonna see people saved. And many of us that grew up in church, if you're like me, for most of my life, if you would have asked me how many people did I lead to the Lord, I would have said zero. And that number is still my number now of people I've led to the Lord is still way too low for what I think God wants to do in and through me. And I wanna see I want to when I go to heaven one day, I wanna see people in heaven that are there because of my witness in their life. Not that I take credit. I can't ever take credit. It's God who saves. Hence the the title, Jesus Saves twenty six. ⁓ but I wanna I wanna be the vessel God uses in the lives of people that will be in heaven one day. And so if you're like me, you're like discontent, you wanna see people move, you wanna see people saved, and you wanna be actually taking a part in that, then text me ⁓ or email me and let's get ⁓ let's get to the Arlington Stadium and let's go participate with hundreds of other churches and sharing the gospel with the nations. ⁓ and all as always, come visit us for church on ⁓ Saturday night at five PM. ⁓ very excited about what God is doing. We're gonna preach the gospel, we're gonna preach Jesus, and we're gonna let him do his thing ⁓ by the power of the spirit. So we'd love to see you at five. We're usually done right around six thirty. ⁓ so we'd love to see you there. And if I don't, ⁓ maybe I'll see you next week, ⁓ when back on the Breakthrough Church podcast. Love y'all. See ya.