Take Action, Day 7 A history lesson. Read Acts chapter 7. Stephen has been accused and now he is giving his defense. His entire message is based on a history lesson. Stephen goes back and summarizes the entire Old Testament in just these few verses. The people of Israel have been saved by God. They had turned from him. We see how and why they needed a savior, and we see how God provided one. Stephen brings them all the way through a story up until the point of Jesus Christ coming and being that sacrifice that was needed. Unfortunately the people couldn’t handle the truth. They turned from it…

Take Action, Day 6 Opposition. Read Acts chapter 6. As we read through chapter 6, we see the action of the early church becoming much more defined. They are figuring out how to serve greater numbers of people more efficiently. They are understanding delegation and how that works. They are recognizing the power of the spirit in their lives and in all they do. As a result, they experience opposition. People start to argue with them. Stephen is one of the chief defenders of the faith. As people argue with him, they realize that the wisdom that he argues back with is from God. You see, when we experience opposition…

Take Action, Day 5 Taking credit. Read Acts chapter 5. After all of the amazing movements of God from the last chapters, this chapter starts out much differently. We still see God moving but in a different way than expected. People are being drawn to everything that God is doing, but unfortunately one couple decides to lie about their motivation to do things. I find it interesting that no one was being forced to sell their possessions. No one was being told they had to give, and yet these two decided to sell something and give the money to the church. The problem was they decided to keep some of…

Take Action, Day 4 Action may not be popular. Read Acts chapter 4. We read this chapter and see the aftermath of the miracle that God performed in chapter 3. It becomes very obvious that doing the right thing does not always make people like you. In fact, Peter and John realized very quickly that allowing God to heal the man through them was resulting in a lot of unhappy people. Sometimes, when we take action and are obedient to God, people are going to be upset. They will not like what we do or how we do it. We cannot guarantee that others will love what we do, but…

Take Action, Day 3 Get up first. Read Acts chapter 3. We see Peter and John meeting a crippled man outside the Temple. Peter makes the statement to him that he’s not going to give him money, but he’s going to help him understand who Jesus is. Then he takes his hand and starts to pull him up, telling him to rise up and walk. It doesn’t say that the man’s ankles are healed while he’s laying there. It says that they are healed as he’s getting up. There had to be action taken. The man had to believe and have faith in Peter and in the God that Peter…

Take Action, Day 2 The languages came first, then the crowd. Read Acts chapter 2. I’ve read this story probably hundreds of times over the years and today was the first time I noticed this. Yes, there are a lot of people in Jerusalem for the Pentecost. The disciples were gathered together and they received the Holy Spirit and started speaking in different languages. Then the crowd gathered to hear what they were saying. I had always envisioned this being a case where the crowd was already gathered and the disciples went out to them and started speaking in other languages to share the message. But that’s not what happens…