"Behold, I lay in Zion
A chief cornerstone, elect, precious,
And he who believes on Him will by no means be put to shame.
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Discipleship Training Course Come… Follow Me!
Lesson 10:The Father's plan to empower His sons.
Review
1. Jesus told His disciples, "You didn't choose me! I chose you! I appointed you to go and produce lovely fruit always, so that no matter what you ask for from the Father, using my name, he will give it to you." (See John 15:16 LB.) We are chosen for discipleship; we are God's choice.
2. Jesus prayed to the Father and revealed that His calling was already in God's heart. "I have told these men all about you. They were in the world, but then you gave them to me. Actually, they were always yours, and you gave them to me; and they have obeyed you." (See John 17:6 LB.)
3. Long ago, even before he made the world, God chose us to be his very own through what Christ would do for us; he decided then to make us holy in his eyes, without a single fault--we who stand before him covered with his love. (See Ephesians 1:4 LB.)
4. It is God himself who has made us what we are and given us new lives from Christ Jesus; and long ages ago he planned that we should spend these lives in helping others. (See Ephesians 2:10 LB.)
We shall see in this lesson...
1. Jesus' promise for the empowering those who are God's sons and His disciples;
2. The need for divine power within the disciple;
3. What effect can be expected when a disciple is empowered by the Father.
Our objective is...
to recognise our need of power to live the life of the Lord and to bear fruit for His kingdom; to prepare our hearts and thinking to receive the gifts of the Spirit so that we can serve Him effectively.
A. Jesus' promise to His disciples.
John 14:12, 15-17 "Most assuredly, I say to you, he who believes in Me, the works that I do he will do also; and greater works than these he will do, because I go to My Father... If you love Me, keep My commandments. And I will pray the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may abide with you forever; the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees Him nor knows Him; but you know Him, for He dwells with you and will be in you. "
The Jesus' Promise
Vs 16 "I will pray the Father, and He will give you...
Vs 18 "I will come to you..."
The Holy Spirit's coming is the invisible coming of Jesus into the lives of believers.
John 16:5-15 "But now I go away to Him who sent Me, and none of you asks Me, 'Where are You going?' But because I have said these things to you, sorrow has filled your heart. Nevertheless I tell you the truth. It is to your advantage that I go away; for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you; but if I depart, I will send Him to you. And when He has come, He will convict the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgement: of sin, because they do not believe in Me; of righteousness, because I go to My Father and you see Me no more; of judgement, because the ruler of this world is judged. I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. However, when He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth; for He will not speak on His own authority, but whatever He hears He will speak; and He will tell you things to come. He will glorify Me, for He will take of what is Mine and declare it to you. All things that the Father has are Mine. Therefore I said that He will take of Mine and declare it to you. "
The Holy Spirit's Task His work is one of conviction in people's hearts... of SIN, of JUDGMENT, of RIGHTEOUSNESS.
John 14:26 "the Holy Spirit... will teach you..."
Acts 1:8 "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."
The Holy Spirit brings Power to Witness John 20:21
Corinthians 2:9-16 "But as it is written: "Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, Nor have entered into the heart of man The things which God has prepared for those who love Him." But God has revealed them to us through His Spirit. For the Spirit searches all things, yes, the deep things of God. For what man knows the things of a man except the spirit of the man which is in him? Even so no one knows the things of God except the Spirit of God. Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might know the things that have been freely given to us by God. These things we also speak, not in words which man's wisdom teaches but which the Holy Spirit teaches, comparing spiritual things with spiritual. But the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; nor can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned. But he who is spiritual judges all things, yet he himself is rightly judged by no one. For "who has known the mind of the LORD that he may instruct Him?" But we have the mind of Christ.
B. Why do I need this power?
John 1:12-13 "But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name: who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God. "
To become a child of God.
Ephesians 3:16-17 "that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with might through His Spirit in the inner man, that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; that you, being rooted and grounded in love, "
To be inwardly strengthened - in the soul.
Ephesians 2:1-5 "And you He made alive, who were dead in trespasses and sins, in which you once walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit who now works in the sons of disobedience, among whom also we all once conducted ourselves in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, just as the others. But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), "
To be made alive and empowered to overcome the lusts of the flesh.
Acts 1:8 "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."
To enable fruitful witnessing.
1 John 4:4 "You are of God, little children, and have overcome them, because He who is in you is greater than he who is in the world."
To be indwelt by God.
Acts 4:31 "And when they had prayed, the place where they were assembled together was shaken; and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit, and they spoke the word of God with boldness."
To be able to speak in tongues.
Malcolm Vine, Cornerstone Ministries. September 2004.
To contact the Bible School email: bibleschool@cornerstoneministries.org.uk
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