The Heroic Heart that Propelled the Movement. Part 2

Today on Summit Life with J.D. Greer. So if you're a generous person, you're generous with your life, your possessions, you're generous with your time, you're generous with your forgiveness, you're generous with your witness.

That's what they were. They were just generous people and they're like, hey, if you take our lives from us, we'd still think it's more important for you to know the gospel than for us to be safe. Welcome to Summit Life, the Bible teaching ministry of pastor, author, and apologist J.D.

Greer. I'm your host, Molly Vitovich. You're joining us today in the middle of a teaching series titled Scent, gaining a fresh perspective on faith from the book of Acts. Now, how many of you like a good superhero movie?

Anybody out there? I know I do. And if you're like most people, you have a picture in your mind of what a hero actually looks like. But today pastor J.D. offers us a real look at heroism and it might not fit the picture you had in your mind. He's teaching us from Acts chapter 4 verses 23 through 37 in a message that he's titled the heroic heart that propelled the movement. Let's join him now. In this passage, you're going to see what real heroes look like.

Let me give you a warning. They're not flashy. In fact, what you're going to see is quiet and behind the scenes. We'd have no way of knowing about it if the Holy Spirit hadn't recorded it for us, but you're going to see how they responded to threat.

You're going to see how they responded to danger and you're going to see what made them heroes. All right, Acts chapter 4. We're going to begin in verse 23, but let me give you the context first in case you either weren't here last week or you got a bad memory.

Notice that in the first sign of danger, their instinctive reflex is what? Is prayer. Now I'm not saying to you I'm a perfect model of what a man of prayer ought to be, but I can tell you that that starts me out on a day where I begin to pray much more reflexively and instinctively because I begin to crave the Spirit of God's power in everything that I'm doing.

Prayerlessness is a sign, not that you're not disciplined enough, it's a sign that you're disconnected from the Spirit of God. What do you pray for in persecution? What do you pray for in pain? Typically, we pray for protection or we pray for deliverance from the pain, and I'm sure they wanted those things. And by the way, I'm sure they eventually got around to asking for them because there's nothing wrong with asking for those things, but before they prayed for those things, they prayed for God to make them bold within the circumstances.

In fact, if you're taking notes, write this down. Before they asked for a positive outcome around them, they prayed for a faithful spirit within them. They prayed for faith to be able to respond in a faithful way to whatever the situation would be.

He rose. Because they prayed this way, because they responded this way, the Gospel would continue to spread around the world and eventually it would come all the way to us. Their heroism led to our salvation.

So here is my question for you. Where does boldness and courage like that, where does that come from? Because I dare say, just in my knowledge of you and people like us, we want more courage. We love to be bold. Where does courage come from?

Where does boldness come from? You just kind of will it up inside you and just, you know, I'm just going to do it. I'm just going to get myself. Is that what you do? Or how about this? I heard this strategy before. Visualize a positive outcome, and then that will help you be bold. You ever heard this strategy?

No. Let me be honest, there's an element of that strategy that works. It's called positive thinking.

I know people who use that frequently to kind of work for it. But there's a problem. And the problem is, is even if you visualize good things happening, bad things can still happen. There's got to be a better way, right?

Well, there is. And you'll see five elements in their prayer that made them bold that can be true of you. Number one, they believed in God's sovereignty in their trial. They believed in God's sovereignty in their trial. See verse 24, sovereign Lord told you the word sovereign means in control of everything.

Truly in this city we're gathered together against your holy servant Jesus, all these people, to do whatever your hand and your plan had predestined to take place. What if you believed that kind of sovereignty was over your pain? What if your first response in whatever painful situation you find yourself in was this? What is God's purpose in this pain? You see, listen, faith during the problem is more important than fixing the problem.

And I'm not saying you don't get around to fixing it. I'm just saying that maybe you stop in whatever situation and you just say, God, I know that you're sovereign. Sovereign Lord, all these things happen because you were directing them. And I'm going to be still, and I'm going to know that you're God, that you're going to be exalted among the nations. You see, on the flip side, you'll start doing that with your blessings.

You'll start saying, God, you gave me this blessing. You gave me this new job. You gave me this raise. You gave me this thing. What was your purpose in giving me that?

Maybe it was for his purposes and not mine. See, that's what I want you to start thinking about as you get into these things. I want you to be still and know that he is God, number two. They knew the Scriptures. They knew the Scriptures. Did you see how the first thing out of their mouths in prayer was an Old Testament psalm where they claimed the promises of God? You know what that shows you? It shows you they knew them. They knew what to pray in the various situations because they were so bathed in the Word of God that when life shook them, it just came out.

I love what Eugene Peterson says about this. True prayer is not just talking to God. True prayer is answering God. God's already spoken in his Word. Prayer is just a response to what he has said.

I want you to see the world through the lens of gospel promises because when the Word of God is in your heart and the Word of God is on your lips, then the Spirit of God will be working through you to bring the power of God into your situation. See, number three. They were in awe of the greatest hero. Number three, they were in awe of the greatest hero.

Now, you know what's significant about that? Jesus is totally different than Hercules. He's very different than every other superhero we've ever come up with.

You want to know why? Superheroes become superheroes through their massive strength, but Peter just said that Jesus was a superhero because he died in weakness. In fact, he leveraged his power not to crush his enemies.

He leveraged his power to die in weakness for his enemies so that he could reconcile his enemies back to himself. And see, that fundamentally changed how the apostles saw themselves. And so they start saying things like, hey, if God's for us, who can be against us? He that did not spare his own son, how will you not also freely give us all things? Nothing can separate us from the love of God that's in Christ. He does not hide, or death, or your power, or Rome's power, or anybody's power.

Right? If God is for us, who can be against us? All things are going to work together for good to those who love God or are called according to his purpose.

We're more than conquerors, and we're not going to pick up a sword. It's the power of resurrection that's inside of us. So death works in us, but life works in you, because that's just how God works. You see, if you believe the gospel, and if you're in awe of the greatest hero, you become bold. How could you not?

Right? In the cross, you've been given the greatest grace, so you become gracious to others. In the resurrection, you've been given the greatest promise, so you have confidence. In the Holy Spirit, you've been given the greatest possession, so you've got nothing to lose. And if you've got the greatest grace, and the greatest promise, and the greatest possession, then you'll become bold as a matter of instinct, not as a matter of discipline. See?

Number four. They possessed a generous spirit. They possessed a generous spirit.

Let me show you where you can see this. Now, the full number of those who believed were of one heart and one soul. No one said that any of the things that belonged to him was his own. They had everything in common, shared everything. With great power, the apostles were giving their testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and God's grace was so powerfully at work among them all. It was not a single needy person among them, not one, for as many as were owners of lands or houses sold them and brought the proceeds of what was sold, and they laid it at the apostles' feet, and from there it was distributed to each as any had need.

Here's what I want you to see from that. Their boldness and witness was an extension of the generosity of lifestyle. You see, their boldness got them in situations where to be bold and to be faithful to the gospel meant that they were going to lose their lives.

But because they were so naturally accustomed to just sharing their lives, when they had to choose between personal safety and faithful witness, they always went with faithful witness because they learned not to hold on to the things that God had given them too tightly. You see, they weren't selectively generous, because if you are a truly generous person, you're never just generous in one area of your life. And again, I don't want to smack you, because I'm like this too, but if you're generous in only a few areas but not others, it shows that you're not really a generous person. You've just got a guilt trip about a handful of things. So if you're a generous person, you're generous with your life, your possessions, you're generous with your time, you're generous with your forgiveness, you're generous with your witness, right?

You see, that's what they were. They were just generous people, and they're like, hey, if you take our lives from us, we'd still think it's more important for you to know the gospel than for us to be safe. And I served as a missionary in Southeast Asia. I've told you before about a situation where my team got in a lot of trouble. Four of my friends were put into prison.

I was put under house arrest. I would remember how spiritually low I was during that time because I was afraid, and I wanted to be home so badly. And one of the things that the Holy Spirit used to pick me up out of that pit was he gave me a vision, small v, gave me a vision of a friend of mine who I'd gotten to know who was very lost over there. And basically the Holy Spirit asked me this question in my heart, is that guy's soul worth it? Is his soul worth you being over here away from friends and family? Is it worth you being over here risking your life? Because I'm not promising you you're going to get out of here alive.

Is it worth your life to save his soul? Now, I'd love to tell you how it sprung up. It was like, yes, Lord. I mean, anything was more of a meager response. But see, that was the beginning of God sowing real boldness as opposed to bravado in my life, because there's a big difference in those two. And bravado is what you get by personality. Boldness is what you get by the Holy Spirit. And see, what God did is he then put me down to a place where basically he said, When I came, I didn't deliver my son, but my son died so you could be saved.

So I'm not promising I'm going to deliver you either. You might go to the same place that Jesus did, but because I used his generosity and his sacrifice as your salvation, maybe you're going to have the chance to do that for somebody else. You're listening to Summit Life with Pastor J.E. Greer, and we'll get right back to today's teaching in just a second. But first, did you know that Pastor J.D.

has a new book that's been released in the past few months? It's called 12 Truths and a Lie, and it's all about how to answer some of life's biggest questions. Because if we're honest, there are questions we all have to reckon with, like how could a good God send people to hell? And how do I know what my purpose is in life?

Thankfully, we don't have to search for answers aimlessly. God gives them to us in Scripture. In 12 Truths and a Lie, Pastor J.D. points us back to the ultimate source of truth to help us wrestle with these big questions and helps dispel our doubts. This month, we're sending the book and its accompanying family-friendly discussion guide to you as our way of saying thank you for your gift of $35 or more to this ministry.

To give now and receive your copy, head to jdgreer.com or call us at 866-335-5220. Now, let's get back to today's teaching. that you're a little too excited or you're a little too much of a Jesus freak? Really?

Really? What did he do to save your soul? And you're not going to deal with a little opposition?

You're not going to deal with a little gossip? They scorned him so badly they stripped him naked and made him die alone in the sun, and you don't want people talking about you around the water cooler. You need to repent.

I need to repent because half the time I'm motivated, like, well, what are they going to think about me if I do this? Number five, they were filled repeatedly by the Holy Spirit. They're filled repeatedly by the Holy Spirit. You see that in answer to their prayer, God filled them with the Holy Spirit. He came in so powerfully, he shook the place where they were meeting. Now, let me first help you see what's going on with that because I want you to get the significance of that. All right, so every time in the Old Testament when God came down to earth, the place shook.

Right? Isaiah 6, when God comes into the temple, it shakes. When God comes down on Mount Sinai, the place shook. And usually that's a terrifying experience and people cower in fear. Now, the Holy Spirit's coming and they're not cowering in fear, they're rising up in boldness.

Why? What's the significance of that? Well, because when Jesus died, Matthew 27, there was an earthquake. When Jesus was resurrected, it says there was a kind of small earthquake. What's happening is Jesus received the earthquake of God's judgment and the earthquake of God's terror so that I could receive the earthquake of his power. So when the Spirit of God comes upon us, we now shake not with fear like they did in the Old Testament, we shake with boldness like they do in Acts 4. We shake with worship because we are amazed that the God who saved us, the God who is so holy that not one sin could enter into his presence. That God now lives inside of us. And if that God is for us, who could be against us, how could I not shake with boldness and power?

You see where it says that the place is shaken? The next phrase is, and they continued to speak the word of God with boldness. The more the place was shaken, the less the Christians were. The more they were shaken by the Holy Spirit, the less they were shaken by the threats of their enemies. And they needed this kind of experience often. They needed this kind of experience often.

You see, let me again just get real with you for a minute. They thought they needed to be filled with the Holy Spirit repeatedly. When's the last time you asked for the fullness of the Holy Spirit? So Peter and John feel like they need it all the time, but you, superhero, oh no, you don't need it. You're like, oh, I'm saved, I'm good.

Really? Here's Peter and John, they are dependent, they're desperate on fullness of the Holy Spirit. Here's a little theology lesson. You got the Holy Spirit when you got saved, you got baptized, one baptism, 1 Corinthians 12, 13, by one Spirit, we're all baptized in one body. You got all the Holy Spirit at that point, but there are frequent repeated fillings throughout the book of Acts, and you got to seek those because they are the air you breathe, they are food for your soul, and without those things, you will never be bold. That's how they were bold.

If they were filled with all that, you're like, well, what's the fullness of the Holy Spirit, what's that like? The analogy I've used with you for years, and I think it's just so clear and helpful, for me at least, it comes from a Puritan named Thomas Goodwin, and Thomas Goodwin says, here's what it's like. He uses the example of a father walking along with a young son.

My son is three years old, so that would be a good one for me. So I've got my three-year-old son, Adam, and he's walking beside me, and then I look down at him, and I just get overwhelmed with this feeling of how cute he is, and so I pick him up, and I spin him around, and I throw him up in the air safely and catch him, and I blow raspberries in his neck, and I'm just like, who's your daddy? You know, with this little thing we go through, and he's like, you're my daddy.

And it's just this awesome moment, and then the moment passes, and I put him down, and I hold his hand, and we keep walking. Now, question. Was he any more my son when I picked him up than he was when I was just holding his hand?

No. Legally, not one bit more. He was every bit as much legally my son then as he was when I picked him up, but he felt his sonship more in that moment than he did when he was walking on the ground. The fullness of the Holy Spirit does not change your status as a son or daughter. It does not make you closer to God.

That is fully settled legally in Christ, but what it does is it increases your awareness of your sonship. So listen to what Paul says. Paul says, I pray that you might have your mind open to how wide, how high, how deep, and how long is the love of God, because then you will be filled with all the fullness of God. So in other words, the fullness of the Holy Spirit is when your mind has been open to how glorious God is, how great of a father he is, how great his grace is, how much of a sinner you were, how close he is to you. And when that feeling floods your heart and you are spun around in his arms, then you come down from that experience bold and you are ready to preach the gospel because you know the intimacy with your father.

Does that make sense? They needed that often. They needed it often. And I would say that I look at many of you and if we just had an honest moment, I said, when's the last time you asked for the fullness of the Holy Spirit? The question would not be when was the last time. The question would be when ever have I asked for the fullness of the Holy Spirit? See, I just feel like you need to be asking for it all the time. I try to.

You need to, because without him you can do nothing. So five things that gave them boldness that are going to give you boldness, they believed in God's sovereign purpose in their trials. Number two, they knew the scriptures. Number three, they were in awe of their greatest hero. Number four, they had a generous spirit.

Number five, they were frequently filled by the Holy Spirit. So let me use my last little bit of time here to ask you this question. How do you apply this? I was thinking about that as I got to the end of the message because I don't like that I'm the kind of person who always gives to-do lists, but I am the kind of person who always gives to-do lists, so I just have to deal with that. What do you do this week as a result of this?

How do you apply it? I was first tempted to tell you some glorious stories of people who've gone overseas and given their lives boldly because the gospel was worth it. I was tempted to do that, and by the way, there are a bunch of you at all of our campuses that that is exactly how you need to apply this message. God's going to lead you overseas, and you're going to be bold. You're going to give up your life so other people can know the gospel, but that's not the main way that I thought we should end it because while that applies to some of you, it does not apply to all of you.

Let's be honest. When it comes to boldness, we need baby steps, don't we? So I'm going to give you boldness for beginners.

Can you not be insulted by that? Let's just do boldness for beginners. I'm going to give you some stuff that every single one of you could do this week that would be your first step toward boldness. Here we go.

I'll give you a handful of them here. A, saying something when saying nothing would be easier. Saying something when saying... You know exactly what I'm talking about.

You have that moment. You probably didn't know it was the Spirit of God, but when the Spirit of God puts something in your heart that you really ought to say to somebody, and it's just a whole lot easier to not warn them because you don't want to put the relationship at risk, and you say nothing, and the way that you can be bold this week is by saying something when saying nothing would be easier. Letter B, taking advantage of opportunities when they present themselves, offering to pray for somebody. You're having that conversation at work, and it comes up, and you just say, hey, I don't want to make this weird, but can I pray for you right now? Can I tell you one of the best witnesses you can have is letting somebody hear you talk to your father about their problem because they hear tenderness. They hear your faith as you do that, and by the way, that's an easy way to preach the gospel to them.

I do that all the time. I pray for waiters and waitresses all the time, people that I've never met, and I just pray the gospel to them. Lord, this person has told me this, and I want to pray about that. God also wants you to know that you... I want them to know that you died for their sins, and you did that so that they could be saved. I pray that they would come to know that one day. You just pray for them.

How about this? Asking them if you can share your story with them. I mean, that's a very non-threatening way to begin the conversation, right?

You're like, hey, I'm your friend. Could I just tell you a few things that God has done in my life and the difference that he's made? I was talking to a restaurant owner at our church this week who said that God has been getting a hold of her life, and she said, you know, I train a new set of employees, and she said, I've never done this before, but in the middle of training them, I just felt like I needed to give God glory for what he has done here at our restaurant, and so I just stopped, and I said, hey, I just want you guys to know that we treat other people around here the way that we think God's treated us, and the key to our love of excellence is the fact that God treated us actually, and she says, I gave God glory.

That's all I said. That's a beginning step toward boldness right there. Let her see creating opportunities. That means sitting with a different group of people at lunch. I mean, you don't have to hide your Bible behind your back when you go, you know, waiting for them to say the wrong thing, and then pow, smack them in the face with it. I just mean taking them out and then looking for a chance for you to pray for them, looking for a chance for you to tell your story, maybe inviting them to read the Bible or to come to church with you, or how about this way, as a way of applying that, creating opportunities. How about when you go home, not just driving your car in the garage, shutting the door, and going in for the rest of the evening, right? I mean, I know what it's like. You come home, you see some of your neighbors that are out, you know, in their yards or whatever, and you're like in the garage, boom, shut down.

That's it, right? Your first baby step toward boldness could be maybe parking your car, walking back out, and just having a conversation, because you're never going to be able to speak the Word of God in people's lives if you don't know them, right? So you just get to know people, take it, create opportunities, letter D, getting involved in the mission. Get involved. We'll train you if you get involved here. We will.

By the way, you want to do a little dirty secret? You know why we try to get you on mission trips? We do love the mission field, and we want you to go overseas, but we know there's no better way to train you to share your faith than to send you overseas, so we got an ulterior motive.

So we'll let you pay $2,500 or $1,500, however much it costs to go all the way overseas to learn what you really should be doing here, but for some reason it just works. You go as a missionary, you come back as an actual disciple. That's our game plan. Just get it, go on one, all right? Letter E, how about just asking God for boldness? That could be your first baby step toward boldness is just asking God to make you bold, right? That's a bold step to say, God, make me bold. Small step, believing the word of God, looking to the Holy Spirit and letting Him do the work. We have a God in the Holy Spirit who loves to help. Just put yourself out there.

Take that first step and watch what He does. Boldness and sharing our faith doesn't come easily, so leaning into the power of the Holy Spirit is essential to taking that baby step to either create an opportunity or to seize one already in front of you. You were listening to Summit Life with Pastor J.D. Greer and a message titled The Heroic Heart That Propelled the Movement.

Not long ago, I sat down with Pastor J.D. and I mentioned how some of our listeners may already have a copy of his newest book, 12 Truths and a Lie, that we're giving away this month. So why get another one?

Here's what he had to say. Yeah, that's a fair question. Well, I would say it's because I wrote this thinking that you would be able to walk a friend who has these same questions through it with you. Maybe that's a family member, a grandchild.

Maybe it's a brother or a sister or a neighbor. What we've done here exclusively for our Summit Life audience is we've provided a discussion guide that you could give this to a friend and then use the discussion guide to navigate. I think it'll strengthen your faith.

And my hope is that it enables you to better reach out to somebody with more confidence, to be able to meet them where they are and help them on that road that the Holy Spirit has them on and bringing them to Jesus. Hey, you can reserve your copy of both the book and the discussion guide. You can get it today at J.D.

Greer dot com. You can get your copy of Pastor J.D. 's latest book, 12 Truths and a Lie, as well as the discussion guide that goes along with it when you give $35 or more to this ministry.

Not only is the book written in a way to help those who are exploring their faith, the family friendly discussion guide helps you take conversations to a deeper level with a friend, your family or a small group to give. Just call us now at 866-335-5220. That's 866-335-5220. Or you can always head over to J.D.

Greer dot com. I'm Molly Bidevich, and I am so glad that you joined us today. Be sure to come back Thursday when Pastor J.D.

continues our study in the book of Acts. We'll see you right here on Summit Life with J.D. Greer. Today's program was produced and sponsored by J.D. Greer Ministries.