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The Ascension

 The Ascension

Today is celebrated as Ascension Day.  The book of Acts in chapter 1 verse 8 records the last words spoken by Jesus to His disciples as such:

“But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be witnesses to Me in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.” 

We Pentecostals/Charismatics/Full Gospel people love to focus on the “shall receive power” part of the coming of the Holy Spirit upon a believer.  What we overlook or even misunderstand is the purpose for that power.  It is for being WITNESSES to the world around us.  Our purpose is not to hold up in our church buildings to impress one another with our Spiritual gifts.  It is to GO into all the world and make disciples of ALL nations. 

The police don’t sit around the police stations waiting on the criminals to turn themselves in, the firemen don’t wait around the firehouse for the fires to come to them, the farmers don’t sit in the farmhouse when harvest time comes and Christians are not meant to be sitting in the church building waiting for the nations to come to them.  

In many denominations and groups that still believe that there is power to be received with the baptism of the Holy Spirit there is the belief that the initial evidence of such is speaking in tongues or one of the other spiritual gifts listed in 1 Corinthians 12.  While I have no argument with this, I would say that a much better indication or outward evidence/sign would be that of being a witness for Christ.  In Acts chapter 2 the greatest miracle of the baptism with the Holy Spirit was not the sound of a might rushing wind, the cloven tongues of fire nor the 120 speaking in tongues.  No, the most powerful thing was that those who were hiding in fear were now bold witnesses for Christ. Peter the one who denied Jesus 3 times now is preaching to a crowd of thousands the gospel of Jesus Christ in the same city that had just crucified Jesus 50 days earlier. 

Let us truly worship the Lord by being an empowered people who will lovingly obey His instruction to us the body of Christ and go in to all the world and make disciples.  

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