Be a change agent

Acts chapter 6 verse 7. Since all of us have Christ in our hearts, we have the Holy Spirit that empowers us, that we have been sealed by His Presence, His divinity, we need to be exposed to some things that the Lord showed me through the Book of Acts. Some features, they are not all, I imagine there will be many more but here are some interesting ones that I would like us to see.

He says in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit: "And the Word of God increased, and the number of the disciples multiplied greatly in Jerusalem, including a great number of priests obeying the faith." I'm going to read it again "And the Word of God increased, and the number of the disciples multiplied greatly in Jerusalem, including a great number of priests obeying the faith."

Thank you Lord for Your Word, thank you Lord for this time, Lord, that you are going to allow us to expose ourselves, Lord, to what You have prepared for each one of us today. We are hearers and we also want, Lord, to be doers of the advice of Your Word in our lives in the name of Jesus, amen and amen.

There are things that have been motivating and bringing a rethinking of what the Lord's Church is really called to do in this world. I developed a personal idea. Many of us Christians, believers, are so concerned with fabricating our own defenses because of our weaknesses, that we are forgetting that there is a world that needs to see and experience through us the power that God has declared to each of us. we.

Knows? there is a Word, there is a portion in Acts chapter 1 verse 8 that has so much significance in the believer's life: "But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you." We will receive power to be witnesses, and when one is a witness, he is a person directly related to an action, to an experience, to a situation. The Lord's Church today is called to witness the restorative work, the miraculous work, the regenerative work of the Holy Spirit in these days.

Knows? and in this context I want to invite you to be able to understand, to open our minds a little about what this Word is saying and how some of the characteristics of believers today are necessary for the extension of the Word of the Lord to others. Knows? The first part of this verse calls my attention, it says: "And the Word of God grew."

It is interesting how the concept of the Word of God is not just a scripture or a reading through the Bible. We know that the Word of God is a movement, it is an action given through and by the mouth of God to experience His wonders. From the Word we know that God constituted the universe. He spoke and things were made out of nothing. How many believe that? Or does anyone think it came from the monkey, or some kind of weird explosion out there?

Today I was watching a report on how the Earth was formed. It really is amazing how science tries to nullify what God has done so perfectly. They still dared to say that they don't know but almost by chance the planets have an exact distance between one another. Casual things don't turn out so perfect if there isn't a designer who provokes them. When someone does things and in this case God through His Word, when the Word of God is activated through each of His children, through His people, then powerful things begin to happen in our midst.

When the Word of God begins to activate, then it begins to grow, it begins to spread, it begins to show itself. Even the apostle Paul in First Corinthians chapter 6 says: I have not come with a word of human wisdom to speak to you but with the experience of the Holy Spirit.

We are used to the letter, we are used to the speech. I want to tell you that God is more than a scripture, I want to tell you that God is more than a reading, I want to tell you that the Lord is power and in that power there are works, and when the works are manifested there are signs, there are wonders. And they will lay hands on the sick and the sick will be healed. And when Pedro toured the city, and when Pedro walked, Peter's shadow still had power. And when the Lord walked and someone touched the mantle of the mantle, power flows because God is power. And we are His children. And if the Father has power, he also gave us the children the opportunity to exercise that authority and that power so that the Gospel of the Lord continues to spread.

Knows? And in this context, I want to invite you to understand that the Word of God grew, but just as it grew for others, it had some important characteristics. I love it you know? because in the Book of Acts chapter 9 verse 31, the believers, the Christians, the Church developed some interesting relationships that allowed the Lord's to move in a powerful way. I love reading Acts chapter 2, every time I read it I get tremendous lessons. Do you know that people did not go to hospitals to take their sick? They took them to the temple.

Sometimes we leave the temple straight to the emergency. The service was so intense that we are asking for a glass of water so we can drink one because we have a headache. Do you know that this experience of a powerful Church is the Church that today the Lord is calling a generation of children, of believers who believe in this restorative model of works, signs, miracles, wonders, of people who are used where the splendor of the Lord is transmitted because the Glory has been born in the heart of each one of us.

The Word of the Lord says here in Acts chapter 9:31: "Then throughout Judea, Galilee and Samaria the Church had peace." How many of us are considered men, women of peace? Is it a woman, is it a man of peace? There are some Christians who preach at the point of sticks. Not even the family wants to have them at home because we don't bring that peace. There is no relational peace that motivates the world where that comes from.

Then they had peace, they were building themselves up and they lived in the fear of the Lord. There are many Christians who are more afraid of the boss than of God. It is that the boss sees them and discounts them. As we do not see God, it seems that he does not discount us.

So I had peace, the believer who does not have peace is not a believer who promotes growth, progress for the work of the Lord. A believer who does not edify himself, who does not edify others, a believer who does not live in the fear of the Lord, a believer who does not experience the comfort of the Holy Spirit, what kind of believers are we, what kind of Christians are we? Why do we come to Church? Why do we get together? What are we going to the cell? Why do we participate in activities?

What is our light in the world? What is our brightness in the world? The Church needs to be challenged to live against the models that the system is offering. In the Book of Acts chapter 11 verse 24 there is a statement about the character and personality of a specific man, about Barnabas. And it says that Barnabas was a good man. Ask your brother are you good, are you good?

Barnabas was a good man. notice. We Christians spiritualize everything, but Barnabas was a good man, and we can translate that good man by saying that he probably had a lot of mercy, he had a lot of compassion. He was a person who activated in the community agencies of the city. He was aware of the needs of the one who was going through a bad time, Barnabas was known as a good man.

But knows? that goodness of Barnabas could not succeed, he says that he was a good man and full of the Holy Spirit and faith. How many good men are there in the world? We could say that many, but if they are not filled with the power of the Holy Spirit and if they are not full of faith, their goodness is not complete. Therefore it does not impact the life of the spirit of the human being.

Knows? Christians have the option, the opportunity to show goodness with power, goodness with authority, goodness with miracles, with signs and wonders. The Lord's Church has a challenge. Is it good, is it good? Is it filled with the Holy Spirit? Does it have peace? Does it edify itself or edify others? When you speak, are people interested in listening to what you are saying? Is the fear of God in your life?

Another characteristic of believers who drive and advance in the Gospel of Jesus Christ. In Acts chapter 11 verse 21 it says that: "The hand of the Lord was with them." "The hand of the Lord was with them." There are characteristics necessary to influence society, to influence the community. The children of God have the opportunity to make a difference, to make a difference, to live in a world that is the same for everyone, but when we are here we can make a difference.

What is happening in your world where you have the opportunity to make a difference? It can bring peace to a world where there is conflict, where there is tension, where there is hate. Perhaps in your family, within your friendships, you are a man, a woman of peace. People, the world looks at you as someone good, as someone good, full of grace, you can help others, you can show the love of Jesus Christ in so many different, so diverse ways. It is the challenge of the Church to show the Word of God in an active way in a constant movement, in a power that allows us to be witnesses of the wonderful work of the Lord.

Knows?. The Word of God begins to be spread through how we present ourselves to a world that no longer has other alternatives. Where are you, where am I going to stop in this world? I will be willing to be used and show the Lord's values as God wants me to see them, as God wants them to be used. In the Book of Joshua chapter 3 verse 5 it says: "Sanctify yourselves because the Lord will do wonders among you tomorrow."

There is no other way to live the wonders of the Lord if we do not worry about showing that holiness that we need to seek in the Lord every day. This concept of a present God is not talking about a God who does things and tells you that he will do them tomorrow and forgets, he is saying that every day He has new things, that every day He works in different ways, that every day He has the opportunity to show itself through you to be hope for other people.

While many are fighting to destabilize the Church, to rise up against the Church, there is a Church that is rising up in the power of God to show what God really is. And know? you have that opportunity, God did not call you to be seated. God did not call you to occupy a certain number in a certain Church, God called you to rise up. God called you to know that He can work wonderful works through you, that you can witness what God can really do in a world without hope.

There are families that are being destroyed, there are generations of young people that are being lost, that there is no sensitivity to God. There are children who are being abused, violated. There are women, there are men, there are entire societies that are being subjugated. Even in our region here in Massachusetts, here in New England there are powers of the devil that have wanted to establish themselves in this city, but there is a Church that is rising up with power, that is no longer afraid of the enemy but is rising up against everything that is called wisdom, against everything that is called knowledge, it is rising up against everything that is called economic, political or communicational power. A Church is rising up that brings peace, that bears the fear of God, that is filled with the Holy Spirit and that is going to show, and is showing that God today is the same as yesterday and will be the same tomorrow.

What is the Church of which you believe or to which you belong? That Church that encloses everything in dogmas or religious structures that are inflexible or that Church that lives on the Glory of God every day? Shine, shine because your light has come and the Glory of the Lord has been born upon you. When the Lord is born on you you shine, you shine. And when something shines, it necessarily draws the attention of the one who is looking at it.

So you have the opportunity today to open your mouth and declare that you belong to the Church of the Lord and that in your hands, listen to me carefully, in your hands is the opportunity for others to be restored, to be healed, to experience salvation. , to experience peace, to experience the filling of the Holy Spirit in their lives. That should excite us, that should move us, motivate us that there are not only a couple of things that are done in the Kingdom of the Lord, but that there are many things.

Know? while you wait for the service from Sunday to Wednesday, between Monday and Tuesday you can be making a revolution in the streets, in your office, in the factory, in your home. In college. There are some young Christians who make it to college who become dumb. There are some who remain silent in the factories, it seems that they belong to the secret of Christianity. We must expose who is the Lord in us, otherwise our Christianity is mediocre. He who has Christ in his heart and does not speak of Him, take a good look at who he has in his heart. He who claims to believe and have the power of God and does not experience it, does not practice it, then take a good look at where the problem is.

Know? you are potentially a useful instrument in the hands of a living God. It doesn't matter if you have high education. It still doesn't matter if you speak English or not, when God wants to use you there is nothing to limit Him through you. There is nothing to limit God's power to shine through you. Only He wants us to be willing. Only He wants us to say: Lord, use me. It doesn't matter. Work with my character, work with my personality, work with my fears but use me. I want to be a useful instrument in Your Kingdom here in this world.

That is the challenge. The challenge of the Lord's Church. The challenge for believers is to begin to have influence through the power of God beyond the limits of our nature. The Lord gave you this place, he gave you your family, he gave your life, he gave you your relatives, he gave your neighbors, he gave the place where you work, that place was given to you by the Lord. So the Lord will do wonders for you. The Lord will show himself powerful through you. Sanctify yourself, purify yourself. Let the Word of the Lord grow in your life to show that He is a mighty God.

The Book of Genesis says: "Is anything impossible for God?" I want to ask you a question: is there something impossible for God? Is there something impossible for God? For the Lord everything is possible, there is nothing impossible for Him and for those who believe everything is possible. That is my Lord, that is my God, a living, real God. A God in constant motion, a God that does not stop. A God who is there doing things through a people, through His children who seek Him.

Close your eyes for a moment. I believe that it is time that many of us experiment in this challenge of the Lord of a Church that can bring the experience of the greatness of the Lord. There is a time for each of us. Stand up where you are. You can raise your arms to the sky. Tell him: Lord, help me to be as You want me to be. Lord teach me to be a change agent in this world. Lord give me the filling of Your Holy Spirit. Lord purify, sanctify my life so that through my life you can show your power so that others can know who you really are.

Lord, I thank you for a Church that is rising up, that is taking up, Lord, the weapons that You have given it to advance and show that it is a powerful Church in You, that it is a Church, Lord, that can conquer and transcend even beyond what our natural experience allows us to see. Lord fill with Your Presence, that the fear of You Lord intensifies, deepens every day. Thank my Lord. Thank you Jesus. Thank my Lord. Hallelujah. Give the Lord a round of applause, give the Lord a round of applause.