Ministry vs. Magic: Why the Holy Spirit Isn't Safe [Part 2]

Pastor, author, and Bible teacher, Alan Wright.

The great temptation in the Christian life is to think that somehow we become Christians by a great, miraculous saving act of God, but that then somehow we start feeling like we need to try to do the stuff He's called us to do by our own power. That's Pastor Alan Wright. Welcome to another message of good news that will help you see your life in a whole new light. I'm Daniel Britt, excited for you to hear the teaching today in the series Unlimited, as presented at Reynolda Church in North Carolina. If you're not able to stay with us throughout the entire program, I'm going to make sure you know how to get our special resource right now. It can be yours for your donation this month to Alan Wright Ministries. As you listen to today's message, go deeper as we send you today's special author. Contact us at PastorAlan.org. That's PastorAlan.org or call 877-544-4860.

That's 877-544-4860. Now, more on this later in the program, but right now, let's get started with today's teaching. Here is Alan Wright. Now, are you ready for some good news? God not only has called you to the wonderful holy things that He has for you to do in His name, He's not only called you, but He is ready and willing to equip you, empower you to do everything He's called you to do by the power of His Holy Spirit. He's called you to good work. He's called you to joy, but He's not just called you. He is ready and willing.

He wants to, desiring to empower you for it all. We're going to study in the book of Acts. We call it unlimited because it's a focus on the limitless power of the church of Jesus Christ that's influenced the world for transformation right from the beginning. And maybe today in this generation, in the middle of global pandemic, there's an awakening that's happening now through the church. And so we're learning all about the Spirit-empowered church.

And today, we come to an interesting place. In Acts 8, the disciples have begun to be scattered because of the persecution of the church under Saul of Tarsus, later the apostle Paul. He was persecuting the church in Jerusalem, and so the disciples began to scatter.

And Philip went to Samaria, the despised area where the Samaritans lived. And he preached the gospel, and there are many signs and wonders and healings and deliverance that were taking place, and many people believe. And we pick up reading in Acts 8, verse 9, but there was a man named Simon who had previously practiced magic in the city and amazed the people of Samaria, saying that he himself was somebody great. They all paid attention to him from the least to the greatest, saying this man is the power of God that is called great. And they paid attention to him because for a long time he had amazed them with his magic. But when they believed Philip as he preached good news about the kingdom of God in the name of Jesus Christ, they were baptized both men and women.

Even Simon himself believed. And after being baptized, he continued with Philip and seeing signs and great miracles performed, he was amazed. Now when the apostles at Jerusalem heard that Samaria had received the word of God, they sent to them Peter and John who came down and prayed for them that they might receive the Holy Spirit. For they had, for he had not fallen on any of them, but they'd only been baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. And then they laid their hands on them and they received the Holy Spirit.

Now when Simon saw that the Spirit was given through the laying on of the apostles' hands, he offered them money, saying, give me this power also so that anyone on whom I lay my hands may receive the Holy Spirit. But Peter said to him, may your silver perish with you because you thought you could obtain the gift of God with money. You have neither part nor a lot in this matter, for your heart is not right before God. Repent therefore of this wickedness of yours and pray to the Lord that if possible the intent of your heart may be forgiven you.

For I see that you are in the gall of bitterness and in the bond of iniquity. And Simon answered, pray for me to the Lord that nothing of what you've said may come upon me. Now when they testified and spoke in the word of the Lord, they returned to Jerusalem, preaching the gospel to many villages of the Samaritans. I once heard about some nuns. They were nurses and they were on the way to care for a patient when their car ran out of gas. And there was a gas station thankfully nearby, but they didn't have any other container except they had a bedpan in the trunk. And they got the bedpan, went up to the gas station, put a little bit of gas in it, came back to pour it into the gas tank. And as they were pouring the contents of the bedpan into the gas tank, a motorist came happening by, stopped, rolled down the window and saw what they were doing. He said, sisters, now that's some faith.

Just like a car can only run on gas, not other things. So it is that our lives are designed by God to run on His power. And the great temptation in the Christian life is to think that somehow we become Christians by a great miraculous saving act of God, but that then somehow we start feeling like we need to try to do the stuff He's called us to do by our own power. But we're learning much about the Holy Spirit.

And today we're going to learn a lot from this incredible story. Philip, one of the disciples who had been scattered is in Samaria. And Samaria is an area between Jerusalem in the lower part of Judea and then Galilee up in Nazareth where Jesus was raised in this area known as Samaria.

They had developed their own worship center at Mount Gerizim. The Samaritans had intermarried and were considered by the Jewish people a half breed. There was so much enmity between the Jews and the Samaritans that they really would have nothing to do with each other, which is why it was a surprising thing when Jesus told the story about the good Samaritan. And it also is amazing that Jesus stopped and went, well, He went through Samaria and He stopped and spoke to a Samaritan woman at a well.

These things were scandalous and stunning because the Jews had nothing to do with the Samaritans. So Philip finds himself in Samaria and he's preaching the gospel. And lo and behold, he's preaching the gospel and all these signs and wonders are happening. People are being healed. People are being delivered from evil and people are coming to Christ.

And it's an amazing thing that happened. But a very, very curious part of the story that I want to talk about today is that it says that the Samaritans were baptized into the name of Jesus. But when Peter and John came, the text says they realized that the Holy Spirit had not fallen on them yet, not fallen on the Samaritan believers yet. And so they laid hands on them and the Holy Spirit came upon them. It was a very curious thing as to how people could, what this possibly means, that they had received Jesus but had not received the Holy Spirit. And I think it's really important.

I want to talk about that today. But also this story has this interesting character, Simon, who is called a magician. And Simon has amazing people all around him in Samaria. But when he sees the real signs and wonders that are happening by the power of the Holy Spirit, he himself becomes a believer in Jesus.

But he's confused. And in his zeal or selfishness, we're not clear, he asks if he could have the power to lay hands on people so they received the Holy Spirit and that he was willing to pay for it. And as we read, Peter was so, so upset about it.

Why was Peter so upset? So that's what we want to talk about today in order to learn some more about the infilling work of the Holy Spirit in our lives. A lot of Christians have grown up and learned a lot about the Father, learned about Jesus, but not much about the Holy Spirit. Someone said, The Trinity is not the Father, Son, and honorable mention. The Holy Spirit is the third person of the triune God.

He's wonderful. And I would say in every sense, He's the Spirit of Jesus. And I think for the Christian, the invitation is for Him to be your your helper, to be your constant companion and best friend in this world. So He is the person of God here now.

He's the fullness of God. Let's learn some more about the Holy Spirit by looking at this very, very interesting story. There's a lot of debate and speculation about what happened in Samaria, because the question circles around this. How can you become a Christian and not have received the Holy Spirit? And I'm going to offer an interpretation of this for you today that I think will make sense to you and will not just make sense, but help us to hunger for more and more of the Holy Spirit's work in our life.

But let me just start by saying I've read so much scholarly debate about this question, and there's a lot of dispute, but I don't want it to be over complicated, lest we miss the point of the story. The point of the story is that when Peter and John came to Samaria and they saw that the Samaritans had believed that they had authentically believed in Jesus, their concern was they didn't see the gifts of the Holy Spirit at work within those believers. They didn't see the power and the signs of God's presence at work through those early believers in Samaria. And so their instinct was immediately, we need to do all we can to make sure that they are fully empowered by the Holy Spirit to live the Christian life.

It's impossible to live the Christian life without Christ's power. And when the early disciples of the apostles saw that, their instinct was immediately we must lay hands on them, ask for the Holy Spirit to fill them. Inserted into this story, this interesting figure, a magician named Simon who became very, very famous, and people called him the power of God that is called great. So it might have been that Simon was even going around and telling people that he was a god, and what he was doing was using some sort of trickery. Probably he was an illusionist, maybe he was an actual magician, meaning the evil sense of sorcery or connection with the dark realm. We're not really sure.

But the whole point of this text is that there is no work that can be done in Christ's name apart from Christ himself, and that comes by the power of the Holy Spirit. That's Alan Wright, and we'll have more teaching in a moment from today's important series. If ever we've been ready for a new year, this is the year. As you start planning and dreaming for a great new year, we want to help.

Alan Wright Ministries has produced a beautiful, inspiring wall calendar with you in mind. Each month not only depicts the month in a heart-stirring image, but also includes a specially crafted blessing for the month from Pastor Alan. As Pastor Alan explains in his new book, The Power to Bless, which releases February 2nd and is available from Amazon for pre-order now, blessing is a biblically based faith vision over your life.

God blessed Adam and Eve and then told them to be fruitful and multiply. Blessing isn't the reward for your productivity, it's the fuel for it. The 2021 blessing wall calendar gives you space to write down all your important appointments and make plans for a wonderful new year. And most importantly, each time you see the beautiful image for the month, your heart will be strengthened by the empowering blessing statement from Pastor Alan. This year, don't just organize your life, bless your life with the 2021 blessing calendar. It is our gift to you when you make a donation this month to Alan Wright Ministries. Contact us today and start your year out right by the power of blessing. Call us at 877-544-4860. That's 877-544-4860. Or come to our website, PastorAlan.org.

Today's teaching now continues. Here once again is Alan Wright. I once saw somebody use this illustration and I'm going to take it and cheese it up tremendously and embellish it greatly. This is a glove.

And when I say cheesy, I mean cheesy. So get ready. This is a glove. It is a work glove. It is a look seems to be well-crafted and made of cowhide leather.

It should be able to do some good work. There's the glove. Now let's imagine the glove is that's a picture of who we are apart from the power of the Holy Spirit. And so often what we do is take the glove.

Again, the analogy is this is us without the Holy Spirit. And we say, okay, glove, you were created to do good work. You're a work glove.

Go do some work. And the glove's not doing anything. And so we say, well, you know what I think this glove needs?

Some inspiration. Glove, you're a fine glove. You're made of nice leather. You've got, yes, you've got places for fingers and a thumb.

You've got, you feel it's tough. You could do some good hard work. I know you can.

I know you can do it. Let me tell you an inspirational story. I once knew a glove that did some really good work for somebody. Some gardening. It did some building.

It used a hammer. Glove, you could do it. And the glove does nothing. And so sometimes what we do is we say, well, you know what I think you need glove? You need, you need some fellowship. That's what you need.

You need, you're too isolated. And so here, get around your brother and sister gloves there. Just feel the love. And so, okay, now can you do it? Glove, go ahead.

You've got the flame. And the glove does nothing. And so we say, well, you know, I think what you actually need is you need some one-on-one discipleship. You need better training.

And that's your problem. You have not been well-trained. And I think if we would get you on a discipleship course and train you up one-on-one, and if you would meet, if you would meet with this glove at 6 a.m. every Friday morning for three years, I think that you're going to be a well-trained glove. And then we get nothing out of it.

And well, you see how the cheesy illustration goes. There's only one way that this glove is ever going to do anything, and that is it's going to be an actual living hand has got to go into the glove and do work in this glove. Well, it's something like that with us and the Holy Spirit that we are made for good works, but we are not made for good works that we are to do by our own power.

We just actually can't. And all of the things that we laughed about right there, discipleship and training and fellowship and inspiration and all of that, all of that is essential in the Christian life, but those things in and of themselves do not empower anybody. What empowers us in the Christian life is the Holy Spirit. And a wonder, well, how can it be that these disciples in Samaria, the earliest disciples there, those Christians, had not received the Holy Spirit? What in the world is Luke, who wrote the book of Acts, what is he saying here?

What is he reporting to us? And I'm going to offer an interpretation for you that I think will make sense to you, but hopefully it'll help you hunger more and more and believe and trust God for the power of the Holy Spirit in your life. And I need to build it on this to say that Luke, who wrote the gospel and then wrote Acts as a sequel to the gospel, he uses a lot of different words and phrases to describe the infilling of the Holy Spirit.

And they're interchangeable words and phrases. So I want to show you just in the book of Acts, starting with the text that we read, one of the phrases that he used is fallen upon, speaks of the Holy Spirit that he had not yet fallen upon any of them. They'd only been baptized. Another word that we saw in our text at verse 17 is received. They laid their hands on them and they received the Holy Spirit. When he said fallen upon and he said received, he's talking about the same thing. Here's another word that he uses, given. Verse 18, when Simon saw that the Spirit was given through the laying on of the apostles hands.

So just in our text today, there's three different phrases, fallen upon, received and given. But look, he also uses other language for the infilling of the Holy Spirit. Acts chapter one and verse five for John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit. Another word, another phrase for being filled, baptized means to be immersed. It means to be completely saturated, filled.

Just the word filled, Luke uses, of course. And they were in Acts two, verse four, he uses the word here, describes what happened to the disciples. They were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance. And the same word he uses in Acts nine and verse 17, where he describes the infilling of the Holy Spirit. He sent me that you may regain your sight and be filled with the Holy Spirit. Luke also uses the phrase poured out in Acts chapter 10, verse 45, for example, the believers from the among the circumcised who come with Peter were amazed because the gift of the Holy Spirit was poured out even on the Gentiles.

And let me give you one other phrase he uses in verse six of Acts 19. When Paul had laid his hands on them, the Holy Spirit came on them. Okay, so I think we could agree that all of these terms are describing the same experience, the infilling of the Holy Spirit by whatever phrase you call it. Luke uses different phrases and it would be a misdirected interpretation of any text to try to distinguish, well, he means something really different when he said fell upon versus when he said received or given or filled or baptized or poured out or came upon them. I think that's pretty obvious and scholars would agree he's describing the same experience.

But he just uses different phrases. You know, it's very hard to describe a mystical experience. So to say we're filled with the Holy Spirit or he's poured out, it can almost make you think the Holy Spirit is like a quantity or something, like you're pouring something, but he's a person.

He's God. And so what we're describing is how we are encountering the living God. And Luke uses a variety of ways to describe the empowering work of the Holy Spirit in the Christian's life. But one thing's for sure, all throughout the book of Acts, there is no discussion ever of being a Christian and not having the Holy Spirit come upon you, having the Holy Spirit empower you, having the Holy Spirit do gifts and work through you and work through the people of God and signs and wonders. There's only one way that you become a Christian in the first place. And that is by the work of the Holy Spirit. Now, this is where the curious question arises for for any reader of the scripture or any theologian at any level is that how could it be that if we become a Christian by the work of the Holy Spirit that joins in to our own spirit in some mystical way and makes our spirit alive again so that we become Christian, how could you say that somebody had not received the Holy Spirit if they had been born again?

So John makes this clear in John chapter 1 verse 12. This is what it means to become a Christian. To all who did receive Jesus, who believed in His name, He gave the right to become children of God, who were born, and look at this, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but born of God. So to be a what we call a born again Christian means that you're born of God. You're born of the Spirit. And this is the only way that you become a Christian.

God does a miracle. Allen Wright, today's teaching, Ministry versus Magic, Why the Holy Spirit Isn't Safe. It's from our teaching Unlimited, and we've got Pastor Alan joining us back here in the studio with our parting good news thought for the day here in just a moment. If ever we've been ready for a new year, this is the year. As you start planning and dreaming for a great new year, we want to help.

Allen Wright Ministries has produced a beautiful, inspiring wall calendar with you in mind. Each month not only depicts the month in a heart-stirring image, but also includes a specially crafted blessing for the month from Pastor Alan. As Pastor Alan explains in his new book, The Power to Bless, which releases February 2 and is available from Amazon for pre-order now, blessing is a biblically based faith vision over your life. God blessed Adam and Eve and then told them to be fruitful and multiply. Blessing isn't the reward for your productivity.

It's the fuel for it. The 2021 blessing wall calendar gives you space to write down all your important appointments and make plans for a wonderful new year. And most importantly, each time you see the beautiful image for the month, your heart will be strengthened by the empowering blessing statement from Pastor Alan. This year, don't just organize your life, bless your life with the 2021 blessing calendar. It is our gift to you when you make a donation this month to Allen Wright Ministries. Contact us today and start your year out right by the power of blessing. Call us at 877-544-4860.

That's 877-544-4860. Or come to our website, pastorallen.org. Back now with Pastor Alan and our parting good news thought for the day, ministry versus magic. And as we talk there about the miracles of Jesus, and as a kid, I think maybe even it's hard to differentiate the two, but you do a great job in this teaching as we place a bookmark here, ministry versus magic.

Well, I think we're all prone to think that there's some technique to it all, right? If we just say the right magic words, do the right magic, hocus pocus. You know, I think as Christians, it's not that most of us are like, hey, I want to try to get into some kind of dark magic.

Although if they are listening and you've felt drawn towards occultic things or astrology, just know the Bible expressly forbids it because it leads down a dark path. But I think for most of us, it's a misunderstanding of really what it means to be filled with the Holy Spirit. So we've gotten to this story that we're exploring how much there's a disdain for magic. And in the end, what we're going to discover is that God doesn't want us to settle for magic because He wants to fill us with His Holy Spirit. And magic becomes our technique as human. And God wants us to live by His gracious supernatural power. He wants to minister through you. And that's not about you. Today's good news message is a listener supported production of Allen Wright Ministries.