Why Most Christians Lack Power

- Well, good morning. Would you help me welcome all of our brave campuses this morning? It's so great to worship with all of you. (audience applauding) I want to remind you, I said last week, but in case you weren't here last week, would love you to sign up for the last stand. Seth Gruber and his team will be here. They'll be speakers from all over the country. They've extended. We're the only church they've done this for. They've given us a code and that QR code. If you use the password that they have for you, it's not just 20% off. It's 50% off for you to come. It'll be worth your time, even if you can't be there the whole time, totally understand, but would encourage you to sign up and be a part of this. It's going to be special in the life of our church. And with that, let's continue our worship this morning as we go before the Lord and get ready to hear his living and his active word among us. Would you pray with me? Our Father in heaven, we do give you glory, honor, and praise for who you are. And Lord, we gather as your saints in your house here this morning to give you all the honor, glory, and praise that you so rightly deserve. Lord, it does well for our soul

when we gather with your people. It does well for our soul when we worship your name. And Lord, it does well for our soul when we hear your word. Because Lord, we as a people believe that every time your word is faithfully and accurately proclaimed that it is you who are speaking to our prayer this morning is speak, Lord, for we are ready to hear. And so now for all those who have gathered who desire to hear the Lord Jesus Christ speak directly to you who will believe what he tells you and who will by faith put into practice what he shows you will you agree with me very loudly this morning by saying the word amen. Amen. Many Christians believe that God is holding something back from you when in reality there's a blockage between you and God. Many people read the word, especially when we read the book of Acts and they say, yeah, that was great that God could work like that back then. Or that's interesting that he could use disciples like that back then. Why is it he work like that today? What's the problem? Maybe God's holding out on me. The Bible says God is the same yesterday, today and forever. The same God we read about, the same God, I am proclaiming the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the Lord Jesus Christ, the same God of the Bible is the same God that's available to us today.

So then why is it that so many Christians lack power? Why do they lack the spiritual power that the Bible says that we have? I mean, one of the greatest glories of the gospel and the mystery of the gospel, what we didn't understand is that when we trust Jesus Christ, the spirit of God, the third person of the Trinity, God himself comes to indwell us. He lives inside of us. Where do you get the power you need from God? Where is he as a believer within you? And so why is it that so many people that say, well, I love God, I'm just struggling. I just can't seem to share my faith or this same habitual sin. I can't get over, I just can't seem to get up. Perhaps it's not because God's withholding from you. Perhaps there's something you're withholding from him. And this morning we wanna take a look at why Christians lack power, why so many Christians lack power. And to do that, we're gonna be in Acts chapter 19 this morning, Acts chapter 19, and I would encourage you to turn there. And when you turn there, you'll realize that as we were concluding last week's message in Acts chapter 18, Paul had finished his second missionary journey and then it was a talk about Apollos and him learning a better way. And this is Paul, while this is going on, is really starting his third missionary journey. And today as we talk about why most Christians lack power,

I'm gonna give you five reasons for that. Now, as you hear these reasons, you can build a list, but perhaps for the five you're doing pretty well in, but there's one that you're saying, that's my blockage. The key is, not that you remember every point that I make, the key is that you allow the Holy Spirit to apply these five points into your life. There may be points where you're nodding and saying, "That's true, I used to struggle with that. "I don't anymore 'cause I'm doing that." It could be that all five of them are areas where you're like, "That's me." And however the Spirit speaks to you this morning is how I want you to hear his word because God's word is living and active. He wants to tell you today why it could be that you're lacking power in your life. Acts chapter 19, starting in verse one, it says it happened that while Apollos was at Corinth, Paul passed through the upper country and came to Ephesus and found some disciples. You remember that Paul had been in Ephesus for a short period of time and now he's going back. He sent to them, "Did you receive the Holy Spirit "when you believed?" And they said to him, "No, we have not even heard "whether there is a Holy Spirit." And he said, "Into what then were you baptized So Paul's telling them like, have you received the Holy Spirit?

Like no, we didn't even know there was a Holy Spirit. We didn't even know a Holy Spirit existed. Like what are you even talking about? So Paul asked them, well, when you were baptized, who were you baptized into? Were you baptized into Jesus? They said, no, we're baptized with a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. It was what John the Baptist was teaching. John the Baptist was teaching to be baptized and repent be baptized because the Messiah is coming. At this point in time, the Messiah's already come. Jesus, God, and flesh as comies, fulfilled the law. He's died on the cross. He's risen from the dead. So he's asking them into what baptism they said into John's baptism. We heard John the Baptist. We believed that a Messiah was coming. We believed that God is coming. We knew that we're sinful and that God was coming to deliver us from our sins. So we were getting ready for him to come. That's what we were baptized into. So we don't have the Holy Spirit. We're waiting on what God's going to do. And Paul said, John baptized with a baptism of repentance, telling people to believe in him who was coming after him. That is in Jesus. He was saying what John the Baptist was talking about

was the one that was coming after him who was stronger than him, whose thongs of his sandal he was not even worthy to untie. His name is Jesus. Let me tell you about Jesus. Jesus has come. Let me tell you about him. He's God and flesh. He was born of a virgin. He's the promised Messiah. He's of the line of David. He fulfilled the law. He died on the cross in your place for all your sins. But he's not dead. He's alive. Three days later, he rose from the dead just like he said he was going to do. And if you believe in him through repenting and believing in Jesus, the Holy Spirit of God will come and indwell you and live with you forever. That's what Paul was telling him. He said you didn't get the whole gospel. And this is one of the reasons why some Christians lack power and insist that they settle for incomplete truth. They settle for incomplete truth. These were disciples of John the Baptist, but they were settling for incomplete truth. You can even be in a church that preaches Jesus and settle for incomplete truth. You can be in a church that preaches repentance

and faith in Jesus alone and falsely believe that because you go to a church like that and falsely believe because, well I'm not really odds with that, I guess I'm a Christian then just because I happen to be here without actually having placed your faith and trust in the Lord Jesus Christ. Or perhaps you're here in your mom and dad or solid believers and you've always gone to church so you just kind of assume I guess I'm a believer too. I don't really have any problem with it. But for every single individual, they must come to a place where you recognize I'm dead in my sins and I deserve a hell because God is holy and I'm not. And if he sent me to hell, he's completely just in doing that. But I don't want to go there and I know Jesus is the only way that I can be saved. And I want to turn my life over to Christ and have Christ saved me. And I want to give him all my allegiance and I no longer want to worship other ideas, other people, other systems. I want to worship the Lord Jesus Christ only. And the Bible says when you turn from your sin and you turn to Christ, you are born again. You're a new creation, old things have passed away and behold all things that made new. And that's what Paul was telling them. And notice what happens when he tells him that message,

verse five, when they heard this, they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. Now you saw earlier they were baptized in verse three into John, they were baptized into John. John told us to repent because the Messiah is coming. So we did it, we don't know the Messiah, we don't know who he is, but maybe one day we'll find out. Paul's like, let me tell you who he is. And he's come and they hear that and they want to be baptized into who? Jesus Christ. That's why after you come to faith, your first step of obedience is getting baptized. Even if you were baptized as an infant, even if you were baptized as a little kid, even if you were baptized early in your life, but you didn't even understand what it meant. You just did it 'cause that's what your church did. When you've fully come to faith in Jesus Christ and you've surrendered to the lordship of Jesus Christ, you are baptized as an outward sign of what you truly believe on the inside that the Holy Spirit of God has now taken over your life. Amen? So that's what happens. They get saved, what's the next step? They're getting baptized. And notice this in verse six. And when Paul had laid his hands upon them, the Holy Spirit came on them

and they began speaking with tongues and prophesying. There were in all about 12 men. So do you need to lay hands on people to give them the Holy Spirit? Do you need to speak in tongues to have the Holy Spirit? Do you need to prophesy to have the Holy Spirit? of course they don't. Not everybody speaks in different tongues. You don't have to speak in tongues to have evidence of the Holy Spirit in your life. The Bible makes that abundantly clear. You don't have to prophesize it. Well, what was going on here? God was using this as a transitional moment to use Paul's authority to lay his hands and pray on them for them to experience a change has been made, and this Holy Spirit is real. If you're asking the question, do I have the Holy Spirit in my life? Here's the way I would answer it. If you've repented of your sin and trusted Jesus Christ alone, you have the Holy Spirit in your life. Romans 8 and verse 9 says it very clearly this way. He says, "If indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you, but if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to him." If you do not have the Holy Spirit in your life, you do not belong to Jesus. The evidence that you have the Holy Spirit in your life is that you've repented and believed that Jesus is the Christ. The evidence that you have the Holy Spirit in your life is that you placed your faith and trust and allegiance in him alone. And experientially, the way that you'll experience the Holy Spirit in your life is you will have greater love for God and greater love for other people that you wouldn't have loved before. I mean, that's the evidence of the Holy Spirit in your life. Things will begin to change. Your attitudes will change. Your behaviors will change. Your desires will change. When you sin, you can still sin the same sins that you sinned when you weren't a believer, but when you sin them as a believer, it'll hurt. There'll be conviction of those things. I'm not enjoying this anymore. This didn't feel right. This felt wrong. Well, why? Because the Holy Spirit is in you saying, "We don't do this." Because what's the Holy Spirit's number one ministry? The Holy Spirit's number one ministry is not to give you tingles. It's not to have you speaking tongues. It's not just to get a word from the Lord. It's to make Jesus Christ magnified. It's to glorify Jesus. His whole ministry was to make Jesus look good. If He's on the

inside of you, what's His ministry? To make Jesus look really good in and through you, that whatever you do when people see you as a man, woman, boy, or girl, they would say, "Wow, I see Christ in them." Because what's the Holy Spirit's job? To make Jesus look good? That's why when Jesus said, "If you abide in me and my words abide in you, ask whatever you wish and it will be done for you." Why? Because what Jesus was saying, if you want what I want, the Holy Spirit will help you accomplish that. If your prayers are, "Make Jesus look good through me." If your prayers are aligned my life completely with Jesus, the Holy Spirit says, "I love doing that. I love showing you that way." Right? But what we have oftentimes in the church is incomplete belief. We were asking the question sometimes when we come to church, "What is the very least amount that I can do because I don't love God and still go to heaven?" Now, we don't say it out loud like that, but that's really what we're saying. We're trying to find a church or a place that doesn't push us, doesn't ask too much of us, tells good story so we feel good about ourselves, maybe even have good coffee or good LED walls or whatever, so that we can feel good when we go there. But please don't push me because when I feel conviction, I don't like that. Right? And so we falsely believe, because we've been inoculated with enough of the gospel that we have it so that when the real thing comes, we reject it. Right? We have incomplete belief and incomplete belief leads to incomplete power. If you want to experience the power of Christ, you need the fullness of Christ in your life. How do you get the fullness of Christ in your life by giving Jesus Christ your allegiance and your worship and serving only Him? And the Bible tells us what will happen. I mean, at the beginning of this book that we read in Acts, he says, "But you will be my witnesses when the Spirit of God comes upon you." I mean, you'll have the power of God. Let me just read the verse. Acts chapter 1 and verse 8, because the disciples were wondering when all these things were going to happen. He says, "Not for you to know the times, but you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you. You should be my witnesses in both Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and even to the remotest parts of the earth." Well, what's God's power for to make Jesus look good? What has God give you power for to accomplish His mission? So when you're life aligns with Jesus, I want you to look good and I want to be used in your fulfillment of the Great Commission. Will you give me power to do the very things you've asked me to do? The Holy Spirit says, "I've been waiting. Let's go." Because the Holy Spirit always abides at the voice of Jesus. You see it all the way in the

beginning of our Bible. In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. What do you see in verse 2? That the Spirit of God was hovering on the waters. What was He hovering on the waters for? Because He's waiting for the Lord to speak. Let there be. And then the Holy Spirit's like, I'll do whatever you say. Let there be light, boom light. The Holy Spirit responds to the Word of Jesus. That's His job. That's what fires Him up. See, many of us live our lives, like, you know, when our cell phones are at 1 percent. Like we know that there's something we can do, but we got to go sparingly because I only got this much power and I can't make a call and I can't do anything because if I do I'm going to run out, right? And the reason that we feel that way and the reason we experience that is because we don't want to go all in with Jesus. You know, when we go all in with Jesus, He immediately reboots. He immediately recharges. He immediately says, "Oh, you ready? Okay, I'm ready too because I've been ready. I haven't been holding out on you, but you've been holding out on me." And what you discover is you can't experience the fullness of Christ when you only have incomplete truth. And here's the reality, once the truth is clear, something else should happen in your heart. Let me give you a second reason why most Christians lack power. The first is they settle for incomplete truth. The second is this, they stop speaking boldly about Jesus. They stop speaking boldly about Jesus. Notice this, after this took place, verse 8, "And He entered the synagogue and continued speaking out boldly for three months, reasoning and persuading them about the kingdom of God."

We read it in every single city that He went into. He went and He reasoned with them. He spoke boldly. He persuaded them. But when they were becoming hardened and disobedient, speaking evil of the way before the people He withdrew from them and took away the disciples, reasoning daily in the school of Tyrannius, which was a lecture hall. So He's now going to leave the synagogue and go to a lecture hall because the synagogue doesn't want to hear anymore about Jesus. And notice how long He was there. This took place for two years so that all who lived in Asia heard the word of the Lord, both Jews and Greeks. So Paul stayed in Corinth for a year and a half. He's going to stay in Ephesus for two years. Now here's what I want you to see. You say, "Well, what does it mean to speak boldly? Let's just talk about that for a minute." Boldness is not being obnoxious. Boldness is not about coercing people. Boldness is not about being somebody where people would see and be like, "What a jerk! That's not boldness." Boldness comes from the Greek word paracia, which means freedom or openness or confidence or fearlessness or speaking without restraint. In other words, I'm going to tell you about Jesus because Jesus is most important to me. That's what speaking with boldness means. Now, let me tell you, if you're not talking about Jesus, why you're not talking about Jesus. Because if you don't understand the why, you can't fix it, okay? Here's the why, because you don't love him enough. That's the why.

You talk the most about what you love. Everybody does. There are people in our town that talk about the Broncos and the abs, not really the Rockies, but other teams. They talk about because it's where their heart is. There's people that talk about feet or there's people that talk about their vacations. There's people that talk about their bank account. There's people that talk about relationships. Why do they talk about all those things? Because it's where their heart is. If you're not talking about Jesus, it's not, well, you better go talk about Jesus. Okay, my pastor told me, so I'm going to go talk about Jesus. That's not how it works. It's because you don't love him enough. Because if you really recognize, you were on your way to hell for all eternity. And this Jesus left heaven and put on flesh for all eternity. And he left his father and he came down and he served to the point of being spit upon, mocked, beaten, and all the different things that happened to him. Up until the point he was crucified dead, rose from the grave. And even after he did that, people were still refusing to believe in him. But he did it so that you could have new life and you could live with him forever. And he could present you faultless before his father some day, in spite of all the bad you've done. Jesus is going to take you as a born again believer and say, "This is Jeff. He's awesome. I love him. He's perfect." If you can't get excited about that, you don't know who the Jesus is that you're serving, right? Amen.

And I'm not just making this up because if you turn to the book of Revelation, and we've talked through this book, you can see it online, but he addresses seven different churches and chapters two and three, guess who the first church is that he addresses, Ephesus? Some years later, this church that was flourishing, some years later, this church that loved Jesus in Revelation chapter two and verse four, he says, "But this I have against you that you lost your first love." You can tell when somebody's ready to get married because they can't stop talking about the person that they're dating and they can't stop spending time with them and they can't stop telling you, "Oh, this, this, this, this, this, this, this," because they're consumed with that. Amen? Fans talk about their team. Sometimes we see new believers when they first come to Christ, they can't stop talking about Jesus, but then we give them so much religion that over time they're like, "Yeah, I already know all that," and they've lost their first love. If the gospel gets old to you, please go back and read the New Testament because the gospel should never get old. I mean, for all eternity, the gospel is not going to get old. I mean, we're going to look at each other in heaven 10 billion years from now and pinch ourselves like, "Can you believe we're here?" Like, I can't even believe he would let somebody like you in and you'd be like, "I was thinking the same thing about you. I mean, can you believe?" I mean, it's amazing what God is willing to do for us and it should never get old. It's the most miraculous story that could have ever been told and ever will be told. So speak bold about Jesus. Paul tells us in 2 Corinthians 5 and 14, he says, "For the love of Christ controls us." Can I tell you why you lose your first love? Because you forget that ministry is relationship. I mean, think about Jesus, how he sums up everything, the greatest teacher that ever

lived and ever will live. He says in Matthew chapter 22, verses 37 and following, he said, "When he's asked the greatest commandment of the law, he says, "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the greatest and foremost commandment, the second is like it. You shall love your neighbor as yourself, on these two commandments depend the whole law and the prophets." He said, "If you want to sum up the entirety of my teaching, love God and love other people." He even said in John 13, "This is a commandment that I give you, a new commandment that you love one another just as I have loved you." So what's this love? It's love with the Father. It's a love relationship with God that translates into the way that we love everybody we come into contact with. It's all relationship. We turn it into religion. We turn it into a thing that we do. We turn it into a place that we've got to be. We turn it into behaviors we've got to change. Why are you changing those behaviors? Why are you gathering in this place? Because we love God and want to be transformed by Him so we're going to love other people. And when Christianity moves from relationship to duty, you lose your first love because then you start going through the motions and then there's really not that much of a need to study the Bible because I've already studied the Bible. I've already read through it so many times I can tell you about all 66 books. I don't need prayer. I do it all the time. Why would I ever come to first Tuesday? I pray on my own.

But if it's about relationship and prayer in the ministry of the Word or the way that I can grow closest to Jesus and I want that relationship, then I'm going to pursue those things and I'm going to gather in service on Sunday because I want to pursue Him with other people that are wanting to pursue Him because I know my heart changes when I pursue Him. And I also know that when I pursue Him and the closer I get to Him in the light of His holiness and who He is, He begins to show me things about me that still aren't put together yet that while positionally I'm perfect, practically I'm not. And He's still working on me and if I'll allow Him to continue to change me, guess what? The way I treat other people is more like Jesus would treat them. And it's this ongoing process until I meet Him face-to-face because it's all about relationship. If you want to know how much someone loves God, you can tell how much someone loves God by the way they treat other people because how can you say you love God whom you haven't seen when you can't even love your brother whom you have seen? God says you're a liar because if you can love the God that you don't see then you certainly can love the people that He died for. Amen? And so it's all relationship. So when you hear me from the Pope it's saying you need to speak more boldly about Jesus. I'm not saying be more religious and obnoxious. I'm saying would you fall more in love with Him so that what comes out of your heart is how much you desire God? Have you taken time this week or in the last month or just to write down the things in your life that you're thankful for that God's done without you even knowing about it? And all of a sudden you start recognizing it. If you try that exercise it will take a lot longer than you think it will. And the more you see what God is doing and has done and what He's forgiven and what He's growing you in and you're thanking Him for it and you're praying to Him and you're giving Thanks and all your circumstances God's gonna grow you why cuz it's about relationship If you don't have a quiet time with the Lord,

you don't spend daily time with the Lord. If you don't get away to spend time with the Lord, or if Bible studies become boring, or prayer, I just can't do it, then you're going in with the wrong motivation. You're going in with the, oh, I have to. My pastor told me to spend some time. That won't work. It won't work if you're dating somebody, and it won't work with Jesus, okay? You go in because God, I want to get to know you. And I don't even know that I feel like getting to know you today, 'cause my attention is in some other place than you, and I know it doesn't need to be. Lord, would you help me? Would you show me more of you today? 'Cause I want to fall more in love with you, 'cause I want to be more consumed by you, 'cause I just want your work to be done in and through me. And if your desire is the love of Christ, if your desire is to know how much he loves you, he'll be happy to show you. And you'll be delighted to receive it. And the more delighted you are to receive it, the more you're gonna want to tell other people. I do not stand up here and preach, 'cause it's my job. I love Jesus. I really do. I'm looking forward to meeting him face to face. Don't know when it's gonna happen,

but I know it'll be the best day of my entire life. I can't wait to see him. I love him. I know how much he's done in my life. I know how much he's continuing to do. So one of the reasons that we like powers, we stop speaking boldly about Jesus, and the reason we stop speaking boldly about Jesus is that we don't love him as much anymore. And here's what happens when love fades. People start replacing relationship with appearance. What happens in a marriage when love fades, and people aren't willing to work on Christ at the center of their marriage and loving one another, then you just have the appearance of being married. Then you try to pretend what married people should do, and then you kind of fake it to everybody else. When you don't love your job, you don't walk in and tell your boss, I hate you and this job. You fake it. You fake it. You pretend that you love your boss. You pretend that you love your job. You do all the things that, when you don't love Jesus, you do the same thing. Maybe you still come to church. Maybe you still give money. Maybe you're still in a cadre. Maybe you still go through the motions

of all those things, but your heart's far from him. And what Jesus is looking to do is revive your heart. Because if your heart is revived, everything else will fall back into place. Amen? When I say you are loved at the end of the service, I'm not just making something up 'cause it's a cute and clever statement. You're loved. You are so loved that Jesus Christ left heaven for you, that He died on the cross for you, that He rose from the dead for you in hopes that you would respond through repentance and belief in Him and come into favor with Him. And even if you don't, He still loves you. Even if He can't have you. Even if He has to send you away to hell 'cause He can't have your sinful condition. He does it out of love. He does it out of love. He's a loving, God is love. It's not something He does. It's something that His character is. So speak boldly about Jesus. Stay in the truth. Don't have replace relationship with just appearance because here's the third reason why most Christians lack power. And it's this, they fake spiritual authority. They fake spiritual authority.

When you don't have the Lord living fully in your life, you'll fake spiritual authority. So Paul's been with the Ephesians now for two years. Everybody in Asia is hearing the gospel and knows what happens in verse 11. God was performing extraordinary miracles by the hands of Paul so that handkerchiefs or aprons were even carried from His body to the sick and diseases left them and evil spirits went out. Now that's pretty amazing. Now God is not prescribing something here. He's describing something here. He's saying what happened. He's saying that people were seeing the power of God and Paul so much they were taking aprons and handkerchiefs and like touching Paul with them. They would run it to their sick and their sick were getting healed because those touched Paul. It's describing what happened. It's not prescribing what we need to do. If you see somebody on TV that says, I'll send you a handkerchief for 500 bucks. Don't buy it. Okay, it's a fake, it's a phony. Like here's how you know it was true because everybody was getting healed and Paul wasn't charging for it. Amen? So if you have to charge for spiritual power,

there is no spiritual power. Understand? You hear somebody say, if you give more money, I'll prophesy more. If you give more money, there'll be more healing. False. God's power is not bought, amen? Okay, so it's describing what happened. I mean, it's miraculous. That's why we're reading it like, can you believe that? I can't. I mean, I saw, the only thing I've seen even close to that when I read this, which has nothing to do with this, is I picture Elvis with his handkerchief and people fainting, but that has nothing to do with this. I digress. I'm just saying, this is so miraculous. What was going on? God was pouring out power through Paul and decided to show off God's power by letting people touch him with aprons and hankies and they were doing all this stuff and people were getting healed and they were giving God the glory. But notice what happens. This is what happens every time people see a power of God. They think they can package it and sell it. But also some of the Jewish exorcists who went from place to place. So there were Jewish exorcists. There were people that were attempting to get into the demonic world and do different things. There's always people that will try to get into the demonic world and do different things.

You're like, where do I see that? Horoscopes, fortune tellers, 1-800 numbers. Do they sell 1-800 numbers? 1-800 numbers to call and get your fortune read. All those different kinds of things. Stay away from all that. Ouija boards. Just stay away from them. They're all just fake, fake things to get you into the dark, dark realms. Stay away from all that. Reject it. But these Jewish exorcists went from place to place attempting to name over those who had evil spirits, the name of the Lord Jesus, saying, I adjure you by the Jesus whom Paul preaches. So they were finding it was their job to go to people and it was their job to discover what demons they had and it was their job to cast those demons out. Bad idea all the time. Nowhere in the Bible does God say, hey, walk around and discover what demons other people have and try to cast them out. Like nowhere. You don't see it anywhere. And we use things like this, like if the Holy Spirit is inside of you, let me just be clear. The Holy Spirit doesn't cohabitate with demons. If you're born again, you don't quote, have demons in you like ever. You can't. It's an impossibility. So we ask, we say things like, well, you can be oppressed by a demon, just not possess by a demon. But the Bible doesn't really talk like that. The Bible uses the word demonized and every time the word is used in the New Testament

it's talking about somebody that's unsaved. Christians are not demonized. Now the Bible doesn't make clear that we as believers in Christ can give the devil an opportunity or a foothold and be influenced by him in a way that looks demonic. But we don't have a demon possessing us. Why? First John 4-4, a greater is he that is in you than he that is in the world. As born-again believers you are not victims to the demonic world. You're not. As Christians you don't need to look at other Christians like, what demon do you have? You can help people recognize where their sin patterns are and call that out. But I as a born-again believer don't need somebody delivering me. I've already been delivered and saved by Christ. Now what you can have in a church is freedom ministry where someone who has been oppressed for a long period of time because of wounds or because of vows they've made with the enemy who lied to them and they say, "Yeah, you're terrible. You're no good. I am terrible and no good. Yeah, you're ugly. Yes, I am ugly." All those things over years where they have a false identity than what they really are. We can help walk them through freedom and show them who they really are in Christ. And it can seem like delivering. You're not delivering anybody. Christ is the only one who delivers. Clear? Right. So this is what you see in the New Testament when Jesus is talking to the demoniac that has a legion of demons in him. He's not saved.

He's possessed by demons, a couple thousand of them, right? We see it all throughout. So here's what I want to say about that. So they're going through there and now these Jewish exorcists are coming and they're saying this. They're not saying I adjure you in the name of Jesus. They say I adjure you. You need to stop what you're doing in the name of the Jesus that Paul preaches. Like so what are they trying to do? They're trying to package spiritual power. Don't do that. If God's going to pour His power through you, He's going to pour His power through you. There's no gimmick. There's no here's what I must do. There's no one, two or three. Notice the result of this. It's not good. I adjure you by the Jesus whom Paul preaches, seven sons of Skiva, a Jewish chief priest, we're doing this. So a chief priest named Skiva had seven sons. These seven sons are going around saying I adjure you by the Jesus that Paul preaches. Come out. Because they've taught me and this is going to be a way that we can generate some income. And the evil spirit answered, can I tell you this? Evil spirits are real. Okay. There's a demonic realm. There's an unseen realm we don't see where evil spirits fight, good spirits. I mean, messengers, angels, those kinds. If God would lift our eyes and be able to see, which in the Bible has happened a couple

of times, I've never happened to me. I know there's people that claim they've seen. I'm not arguing with you. I'm just saying I've never seen anything like that. But if God could remove the veil and we could see there's warring beings going on all Horsecoats are real, that's why I said stay away from them. It doesn't mean they're going to give you exact information, it means you're going to enter the demonic world and start talking with demons. That's not a good idea, don't do that. Like stay away from all of it. But we don't do black magic, we just do white magic. It's all bad, okay? Stay away from all of it. So they call out, I drew you by the Jesus whom Paul preached. Just notice verse 15. And the evil spirit answered and said to them, evil spirits can talk. I recognize Jesus and I know about Paul, but who are you? In other words, who do evil spirits have to submit to? Not you, but they do submit to Jesus, amen? So they're adjuring them by a Jesus that they didn't know. They're adjuring them by a Jesus whose Holy Spirit's not living inside of them. They're trying to make money off this spiritual power that is going to be fake. They're faking, they're not being genuine. So they're like, I know Jesus, I know Paul, he's filled with the Spirit. Who are you? Notice what happens. And the man in whom the evil spirit, in whom was the evil spirit, leaped on them and subdued all of them. That's seven dudes and overpowered them. And they fled out of that house naked and wounded. Friends, that's a beat down. Evil spirits are powerful.

There's one guy that has an evil spirit. So he's a demonized guy. He's unsaved. And yet these other unsaved people say it, I adjure you by the Jesus that Paul preaches. They're like, well, I know Jesus and I know Paul, but who are you? And the evil spirit empowered this man and beat up all seven, where all seven are wounded, stripped them all naked, and seven naked guys are running down the street in pain. That's what happened. Now notice what happened to the city as a result. This became known to all. You think? Both Jews and Greeks who lived in Ephesus and notice what happened. And fear fell upon them all and the name of the Lord Jesus was being magnified. You say, well, hey, if there's a sin I can't get over, what do I need to do? Well, the Bible makes it really clear. It says in James 4, 7, submit therefore to God, resist the devil and he will flee from you. Like as greater as he that is in you than he that is in the world. So what we talk about here, when we talk about freedom ministry at Brave, we talk about recognize, recognize where you've given the enemy a foothold, recognize where you're sinning, call it what it is, then repent from it. That means I'm not going to stay in this anymore. I want to run away from this. I want to get away from this sin. Then renounce it. Like I'm done with that. I don't want anything to do with that anymore. And then renew, renew your mind, be transformed by the renewing of your mind. That's how freedom ministry works in the life of a believer. Like I'm not going to walk around and be like, oh, it looks like you have the demon of laziness.

No, I went to bed at three in the morning. Oh, right. I mean, there's not a demon behind every rock for everything that we see. And it's not our job to be going around trying to figure out what demons people have. It is our job to call people into the truth. And as believers, if they know the truth and you see somebody that's not living in the truth, you can tell them you're giving the devil an opportunity. And if you continue to do that, he's going to take you in a way that you never would have wanted to go. And that's real. Jesus gave authority to his disciples in Luke chapter 10. And here's what you're going to notice in the end times. In 2 Timothy 3 where it says people be lovers themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud, arrogant, abusive and such. He ends by saying these people will have a form of godliness, but deny its power. Those are fakes. You have all the power that you need in Christ to overcome sin patterns in your life. You have all the power you need in Christ to fulfill the gospel mission, to share Christ, to fall in love. You've been given everything you need for life and godliness. You have it. You don't need somebody else telling you what you need. And many of us walk around with fake credentials. Yeah, I'm a believer. It's like having a fake police badge. I could make a fake police badge. I'm sure I could find one on the internet somewhere, but it wouldn't last very long. If I pulled somebody over, officers, wars, and tribes, notice that you were, let me see your badge. You know, I mean, if I have Christ in me, I have all the authority and power that I need in Christ. Amen.

Now, I want to be really careful on this because I know when we talk about these issues, there are people that see things differently than me. I've been in different sessions with people doing freedom ministry, deliverance. Some I'm more aligned with, some I'm like, that was a little crazy. But they love Jesus and their attempt is out by name. I certainly don't see anywhere in the New Testament we're supposed to talk to demons and get to know one another. I do see that Jesus calls demons by name, ask their name, and cast them out. I do see the disciples say all the demons submitted to us in your name. So I don't necessarily have a problem with some of those practices. I just think in the church we've taken it so far where we think, man everybody's got a demon and we've got to cast everything out. Sometimes it's not a demon, it's just discipleship. Sometimes it's just like this is what the Bible says and you're unwilling to do it. Just do it. You don't have a demon, you're just not doing, you're just not being obedient, you're just disobedient. Amen? So don't fake spiritual authority. Let me give you a fourth reason why most Christians lack spiritual power. They refuse to fully repent. They refuse to fully repent. Notice in the next verse in 18, many also of those who had believed kept coming, confessing and disclosing their practices. So many who had believed these who had believed in Christ, they kept coming. It means they came forward once and they were disclosing, this is what we did and this is what we did that was wrong and we've been in this dark arts and we've been doing these things. So some of the same people kept coming until it was gone, others were probably joining them. So there's this idea that they came and then the word spread and other people because it only takes one person getting honest in your cadre or in the church for everybody to get honest. Once people see me and it's okay if I confess my sin, yes, we're supposed to. Okay, well now that I know that's normal, I'll do that and that's what was happening and they were confessing their sins and they were admitting what they had done wrong and many of those who practice magic brought their books together and began burning them in the sight of everyone and they counted up the price of them and found it to be 50,000 pieces of silver. It cost them something. It wasn't that they had a book burning because their pastor said you all need to burn your books. It was because those who had been sinning by looking at those books and practicing those incantations, here's what they said. We don't want them. We don't want to sell them to anybody. We don't want to give them away. We don't want anybody to experience what we did. The only good

we can do with this is burn it. Yeah, but that's like 50,000 pieces of silver. That's like 50,000 days of salary. That's like a lifetime. We don't care. We want to be free of this garbage that was holding us hostage, right? And that's what they were doing. They were repenting. They were genuinely saying what we did was wrong and we don't care who knows. We want to be authentic with God and authentic with others and we're done with this. So how's that play out today? Well, if you're into porn, you can stop today. Did you know that? If you're in Christ, you can stop today. And if you're not in Christ, you'll never be able to stop. But if you're in Christ, you can stop today. You can call it sin and then you can put things in place that cost you something. Don't have a smartphone anymore. Don't have internet in your house. Well, that's really radical. Yeah. To save your soul. Sometimes you have to do radical things. Amen. If you've been drinking and doing drugs, here's an idea. Get rid of all of that stuff in your house, pour it all down the drain and never go to another bar or place that serves alcohol. That's radical. The gospel is radical. Like if you're really done with it, get rid of it. Don't give it to somebody else. Don't say, well, it's valuable, but I'm not going to use it anymore. Just get rid of it. Like be done with it. And if it's too crazy for you to get rid of the internet at your house, then give your wife the password and let her see all your history and only be on the internet when she's watching with you. I appreciate the golf clap. I do because there's so much conviction in here. Right? Do you understand what I'm saying? We don't take our sin nearly as serious as Jesus. Your sin was so grievous. Jesus had to die for it. And then we think, oh, it's not that big of a deal. It was such a big deal that God died. So what are you unwilling to get rid of? Stop it. Those of you who haven't had an affair, but you might have an affair because you're really chummy with somebody at work. Stop it. You're done being chummy. Right? Some of you that are living together and you're not married, be done like now. Well, it's going to cost us more money to get two places. Yes, it does. Getting rid of sin is costly. That's why you may want to find another church if you don't like hearing truth, but it's kind of like this. If you have a leak in a pipe at your house, you can mop the floor all day long, but it's never going to get dry. You've got to fix the leak in the pipe. You can't just mop. We do such a good job when people are hurt by sin, loving them and caring for them and sweeping the floor, but we refuse to look at the pipe. Well that would take a lot of work and have to cut through the ceiling. I don't care how much

work it takes, the water will stop if you fix the leak. Amen? Sin is done when you desire to be done with it. Jesus is not tempting you to sin. Jesus is not asking you to play around with it. Jesus is not telling you, "Oh, you're really spiritual now. You can get over that." He's not saying any of those things. He's just not. He's saying that where you're at right now and what you're doing right now is hindering your walk with him right now. So he's just done. Be done with it too. Notice what they did. They didn't hide their sin. They destroyed it. They were done with it. They came clean with all of it. Amen? Someone's need to come clean with our sin. Nobody can make you. The Holy Spirit can put his finger on you and make you feel like you're going to throw up until you do, but no other human can make you confess your sin. Nobody. You can sit there with your hands at your side or arms folded and be like, "I can't wait to get out of here. This is way too convict." You can do that. But those who love Jesus and those who want the power of God could care less what anybody else thinks. They just want to be done with sin so they can walk in the fullness and freedom that Jesus has for them. Amen? That's what he has. That's what he has. And when sin is removed, something else happens. Your impact increases. Your impact increases. Notice this. It says that when they did this, so the Word of God was growing mightily and prevailing. Right? And those were verse 21. "Now after these things were finished, Paul proposed in the Spirit to go to Jerusalem and after he had passed through Macedonia and decay," which is Northern and Southern Greece saying, "after I have been there, I must also see Rome, the whole gospel, the whole book of Acts is him trying to get to Rome. And having sent into Macedonia two of those who ministered to him, Timothy and Erastus, he himself stayed in Asia for a while. About that time there occurred no small disturbance concerning the way. That means there was a big uprising with those who were followers of Jesus. For a man named Demetrius, a silversmith who made shrines of Artemis, was bringing no little business to the craftsmen. And he gathered together with the men of similar trades and said, "Men, you know that our prosperity depends upon this business." So Demetrius is seeing the gospel go out. He's seeing the gospel change cities. He's seeing everything that's happened. And it occurred to him that, hey, our whole business is built upon Artemis being the great God. And when Paul and those people come in and start preaching a different God, that's going to hurt our business. And we see it every single place that Paul has gone. We see it in Acts chapter 16 and verse 20. It said,

"These men are throwing our city into confusion." We see it later where it says that the whole city has been turned upside down, you know, that they've been agitating the whole city. And here, Demetrius is saying this is going to be a problem. He says in verse 26, "You see in here that not only in Ephesus but in almost all of Asia, this Paul has persuaded and turned many away a considerable number of people saying that gods made with hands are no gods at all." He's saying that what we do for a living isn't good. He's saying that the gods that we're making aren't really gods. If the word gets out that the gods that we're making aren't really gods and people don't worship the gods we're making with our hands, business is going to be in trouble. We're going to lose a lot of money. So here's what he says, "Not only is there danger of this trade of ours falling into disrepute, but also that the temple of the great goddess Artemis be regarded as worthless and that she whom all Asia and the world worship will even be dethroned from her magnificence." What's he saying? If we don't stop this, he's going to overthrow our God. If your God can be overthrown by a man preaching Jesus, you don't have a God. I mean, do you see the irony in this? I mean, it's laughable. This guy's basically saying, "Hey, we got to rally together because we're not going to make any money. Our family's not going to be able to have any money. We're not going to be able to send our kids to college. We're not going to be able to do anything." So these people that are coming are saying that what we do are not really gods. And if the people believe that, we're not going to make any money. And by the way, Artemis, the great God that we serve, that people are going to think that she's not really God anymore. It's going to ruin everything around here. And here's what I want you to say that many Christians lack power because they avoid the cost of confronting the culture. They avoid the cost of confronting the culture. The gospel doesn't just save. It disrupts. And if it doesn't disrupt, it's probably not doing much. It's probably not doing much. The gospel is not just seeing individual people get saved. It's seeing individual people get saved that start living for Jesus. And when people start living for Jesus, everything changes. Everything changes. Like, people don't get angry when you believe differently. People get angry. not saved, and you're not going out drinking with them anymore, and you're not living the immoral life with them anymore, and all of a sudden, they don't want to hang out with you, because it costs them something to hang out with you. Or you're at work, and you realize, "I'm watching all these people cheat, so I'm going to be a whistleblower and call them out."

They don't care that you go to church. They care that you did the right thing, because now you've made all of them look bad. See, if you're going to live for Christ, other people around you, it's going to cost them something. That's why anybody who wants to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted. If you're going to live for Christ, it's going to cost other people around you to have to hang out with you. It's why some of you, after coming to Christ, it's hurt relationships with your family members. They loved you. They even wanted you to go to church. But now that you got serious about Jesus, they don't even like having Thanksgiving dinner with you anymore, because you're one of them. Do you know what I'm talking about? Anybody here, can I get a witness to somebody? Okay. Notice what happens. When they heard this, they were filled with rage. They're not just angry. They're in a rage, and they begin crying out, saying, "Great is Artemis of the Ephesians." There's no such thing, and they're going to cry out to her who doesn't even exist. They're making gods with their own hands, thinking it's somebody. It's crazy. How dark they are. The city was filled with confusion, and they rushed with one accord into the theater, dragging along Gaius and Aerostarsius, Paul's traveling companions from Macedonia, so they brought a couple of Paul's people there, and I notice Paul. I love Paul. He doesn't run away from trouble. He tries to run into it. And when Paul wanted to go into the assembly, the disciples would not let him.

So there's massive city chaos, and Paul's like, "Let's go." And they're like, "You ain't going in there. You need to stay back here. It's going to cost you your life." So some were shouting, oh, and it says also some of the Azarchs who were friends of his sent to him and repeatedly urged him not to venture into the theater. So some of the leaders in the community, leading men, were like, "Don't go in there. You don't want to go in there. Just don't go in there. It's not going to be good for you." So then one were shouting one thing, and some another, for the assembly was in confusion, and the majority did not know what reason they had come together. That's what chaos ensued. Nobody even knew why they were arguing anymore. Everybody's just arguing. And some of the crowd concluded it was Alexander, since the Jews had put him forward, because the Jews were trying to put forward Alexander to basically say, "We have nothing to do with Paul. We have nothing to do with this. Don't treat us Jews bad. We've had a hard enough time as it is." So they're trying to put Alexander forward to make a defense in the assembly. But when they recognized that he was a Jew, a single outcry arose from them as they all shouted for about two hours. Great is Artemis of the Ephesians. For two hours, I mean, they were so concerned with their livelihood going away because of their false gods, they worshiped a false god for two hours. They're in a fury. After quieting the crowd, the town clerk said, "Men of Ephesus, what man is there after all who does not know that the city of the Ephesians is guardian of the temple of the

great Artemis and the image which fell down from heaven?" I mean, we all know, I mean, the temple of Artemis in the first century is one of the seven wonders of the early world. And we know that her image fell down from heaven and notice what they say. So since these are undeniable facts, you ought to keep calm and do nothing rash. We all know that Artemis is God. We all know that her image was dropped from heaven. We don't need to be rash about all this. For you have brought these men here who are neither robbers of temples nor blasphemers of our goddess. So then if Demetrius and the craftsmen who are here with them have a complaint against any man, the courts are in session and the pro councils available, let them bring charges against one another. But if you want anything beyond this, it will be settled in a lawful assembly. For indeed, we are in danger of being accused of a riot and connection with today's events since there is no real cause for it. And in this connection, we will be unable to account for this disorderly gathering after saying this. He dismissed the assembly. He's not here. The gospel is confronting the culture because people realize if we're really going to believe in Jesus, it's going to change the way we do everything. If we really believe in Jesus, then we're going to have different laws. If we really believe in Jesus, we're going to have different schools. If we really believe in Jesus, we're going to have different businesses. If we really believe in Jesus, it's going to impact everything we do. And for many of us as Christians, we're afraid to engage the culture and say, yeah, that's right. And instead, we're like, well, as long as we can go to church and we can hear the word and we can just do our thing, but we're not going to engage with the culture.

The gospel engages the culture, Jesus engages the culture, the apostles engage the culture, they engage the culture so much they were all killed because they engage the culture. If they had huddled up in the synagogue and never left the synagogue. But we're afraid, and one of the reasons that we don't experience power is power shows up when we need it. Are you afraid to engage the culture? Are you afraid to talk about how our public school systems are an absolute mess? Are you afraid to talk about how pornography dominates the church? And that's why most men don't step up and serve, because they don't feel worthy? Are you afraid to talk about why so many marriages in the church are fighting with each other, but nobody's willing to let Jesus lead? Do you want to talk about in the church how unmarried people are living together, and nobody wants to say anything to him, 'cause we don't want to offend anybody? I mean, the reason that we don't experience the revival that we see in the book of Acts is not because Jesus has changed. It's because we stay in our hearts. Well, that's good for other people, but I'm not stepping forward, I'm not doing that. But when the church is ready to be honest, and the church is ready to come clean, and the church is ready to say, "Jesus, your Lord, "and I'll submit to you, and I don't care who knows, "and these are the sins in my life,

"and this is what I'm doing wrong, "and you have it, and you can take it, "and just make me right, look out, "because revival will break out anywhere in the world "where that is taking place." Amen? (congregation applauding) So in closing, we went long, I wasn't expecting to go this long, but, I mean, here's what you see, you see truth, you see boldness that comes through love, you see authority without being fake, you see purity when we have freedom from sin, and you see the impact when we're unafraid of the cost. What's holding you back? What's holding you back? Which one of those, which of those, is keeping you from experiencing the power of Jesus? This is not a message for the person next to you. This is not a person for your friend that you need to send a message to. This is a message from on high, the Lord Jesus Christ saying to you, "Are you ready to get right with me? "Because if you are, I will pour my spirit in and through you "in such a way that you will experience "the power that I have for your life. "And it will be me that is doing the work. "It'll be me that is getting the glory, "and you'll have the greatest joy in walking with me."

Amen. Amen, would you stand? Father in heaven, we give you praise, glory, and honor for your word today, it's a strong word. It's a hard word, but Lord, we wanna be people, men and women and boys and girls, that build our life upon you. And Lord, I ask you the sense today that we'll have pastors and elders here in the front, just so we can pray with people that want to be prayed with. And Lord, there's nothing magic about our elders or pastors, but sometimes it's just good to confess to another brother in Christ. Hey, this is what I'm dealing with, will you pray for me? Lord, help us renounce our sin, help us repent from it, help us be renewed in our mind, because we recognize that you alone are God. If you're here today and Jesus is not the Lord of your life, you can pray Lord, save me, come into my life, make me like you. God, we give you all the glory, all the honor and all the praise for who you are and all you're doing. It's in Jesus' name we pray. Amen and amen. Who you've got praise for this work?