So far, we have talked about powering up our prayer lives and what it means to be a people empowered by God’s Word. Prayer and God’s Word are the two primary parts where we receive power for our lives – our input system. But a powered up life also requires an output system. For power always involves motion, the movement of something from one place to another. Otherwise it is only potential power. What we want is power that is actualized, power for living. The Dead Sea is the most dramatic example of power that is potential but never actualized. It is the lowest body of water on earth, situated more than 400 feet below sea level, with saltiness eight times that of the oceans. It has healing properties for some diseases and maladies and provides relief for many who suffer from cystic fibrosis. The northern edge of the Dead Sea gets 4 inches of rain a year while the southern edge gets only 2 inches. It’s main problem is that it has no outlet streams. Notice how the Sea of Galilee (a very live and powerful system) has an outlet stream, the Jordan River. But from there everything drains into the Dead Sea and dies. Occasionally, as in 1980, there have been uncharacteristic rains that brought the sea to life, but only for a little while. In Hebrew history, the Dead Sea with its salt pillars is also connected to the cities of Sodom and Gomorah, You’ll remember that Lot’s wife turned into one of those pillars when she looked back at them as they were being destroyed. One of the other names for the Dead Sea is the Sea of Lot. Mt. Sodom is under that body of water. Therefore, the Dead Sea for most of Israel is not just a geological lesson, but a moral one. I believe the contrast of the Sea of Galilee and the Dead Sea is a mirror in which we can see our own lives and the church.

Our scripture lesson says of Jesus in verse 38,

“God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and power, and how he went around doing good and healing all who were under the power of the devil, because God was with him.”

Once Jesus was baptized, he went through 40 days of temptation about his motivations and his methods, and then went immediately out among the people. Jesus was powered from on high for a purpose. So are each of us, both individually and then as God’s body together. Jesus didn’t go do miracles because he wanted to prove he was the Messiah, God’s Son, but rather because the Spirit drove him out among the people to offer healing, hope and new life. And it was the miracles that enabled him to have a hearing among the people. The people said that Jesus spoke as one with authority. That authority was rooted in two things – his integrity and his miracles. Every speech of Jesus was a demonstration speech. The emphasis of that for this morning is DEMONSTRATION. The book of Acts says that when the Holy Spirit came upon the early church they spoke the word of God boldly (4:31), accompanied by miraculous signs and wonders (2:43). And as the people saw the transformed lives of those early Christians and as they saw them reaching out to the real needs of hurting people, their ears became open to the gospel. It was true of Jesus, of the early church, and it is true for us in the 21st century. The world is still looking for demonstration speeches from the people who claim to follow Jesus.

Jesus said in John’s gospel, “This is to my Father’s glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples (15:8).” When I hear people talk about “bearing fruit,” they tend to moralize it, saying that it means that we will be kind, nice, and holy. The contrast is with those who are unkind, mean, and unholy. But that doesn’t seem to be what Jesus means. The contrast is between those whose lives are demonstration speeches and those who like the Pharisees, gave moralistic speeches. Fruit bearers are those who make the love of Christ real in their world. Throughout the history of the church the temptation is to become so religiously busy inside the church, that there are comparatively few demonstrations among the people outside the church. Our worship services, bible studies, prayer meetings, walks and retreats, and fellowship events are great, but not so great if they substitute for “speaking the word boldly and doing signs and wonders among the people.” I saw a window sticker this week that said, “Jesus is coming. Look busy.” That one bothered me. “Looking busy” is when you put on a show because the boss is coming through. We don’t just need to “look busy,” but rather need to “be busy” and be busy about the things that will change our world and connect people to God’s life-changing love in Jesus.

And there is a goal, the multiplication of us. Apples have the seeds in them for more apples. People give birth to people. And followers of Jesus Christ give birth to followers of Jesus Christ. That’s ultimate fruit bearing, and it begins in demonstrations of God’s love in our ordinary daily lives.

So with whom are we supposed to be making these demonstrations? One of the striking things about this sermon by Peter is that it is given when the Lord had pushed him out to people he never dreamed he would be preaching to. Up to this time, the Christian movement was almost exclusively Jewish. Remember that the morning prayers included thanking God that they weren’t Gentiles. Now he is told to eat like a Gentile and then go meet with a Gentile (a Roman Centurion) and then preach to his whole household. Notice the pattern, God’s Spirit may comfort us for a season, but we will not be allowed to remain comfortable. God’s Spirit may comfort and bless the church for a season, but then he is going to push the church out to a hurting world, sometimes among the people we want to be around the least.

In Jesus’ day, it was among the lepers, the blind, the disabled, the deaf, among the powerful and the powerless, and the excluded. And I know that it means that following Jesus in offering demonstration speeches to the world means that we go to those the world casts aside and even to those religious people cast aside. Look at Jesus’ own inner circle. I don’t think you would call Peter nice or sweet. James and John were characteristically rude and overly competitive. Philip, Thomas and Nathanael were skeptics of the first order, causing the son of God to be sarcastic once in awhile. Others like Simon and Judas were radical revolutionaries. Judas and Matthew had histories of financial corruption. The picture of the church most people have is of a group that tends to be nice and passive, choosing to only rock the boat when absolutely necessary. That is not the biblical picture of the church at all. Followers of Jesus are not just boat rockers, they are boat capsizers.

So where are we to make these demonstrations? The easy answer is everywhere, but let’s begin by talking about the place many of you spend more time than any other, at work. What about the way you talk to people, act toward people demonstrates the Christ that you serve. If those you work with heard you share about your faith, would they see it as congruent with the way you work? I was reading something this week that said something that struck me. John Burke, the writer of No Perfect People Allowed states,

“If you interview people on the street, few, if any, associate Christianity or church with anything closely resembling grace. What they feel is law: zero tolerance, judgment and condemnation. Why doesn’t the church utilize its greatest asset? Though the world cannot offer grace, in its absence, it found an inexpensive alternative: tolerance.”

“Our culture diets on the candy of tolerance, but what it really craves is the meat of grace. Tolerance does not value people but simply puts up with their behavior or beliefs. Tolerance alone cannot accommodate both justice and mercy – it can only look the other way.”

So the question is at work, how are you a living demonstration of God’s grace? Grace is often misunderstood as a soft-edged skill, symbolized by smiles and sweetness. It can be that way, but it can also be daring (giving second chances when no one else will) and confronting (offering the truth in love that will care enough to say or do what no one else do). People will never know the radical, amazing, powerful grace of God until they see it in you and me in the daily squeeze of life. Not only are we called to that kind of gracious work, but also gracious parenting, and even gracious church membership. How will you and I be living demonstrations of God’s grace in this coming week?

Yes, I am proposing that the greatest work of the church is that which happens at other times than Sunday morning. And when we get that, we will become the high-impact force for changing the world that Christ has dreamed of. Yet, I think sometimes this becomes a bit overwhelming, changing the world I mean. Bob Shank writes in his book, Total Life Management from his time as a lineman playing high school football.

“My mentor was 6’5” 260# persuader named Many Penaflor…He had a particular way of seizing your attention – by grabbing your facemask and pulling you up real close, so you wouldn’t miss a single word. On this particular day, he grabbed my face mask and yelled in his distinctive accent, ‘Chank, you’re a defensive tackle, not the whole team. I don’t want you playing the whole field. Here’s your job.’ He then scratched a 10 x 10 foot square around my spot and said, ‘This square is yours. Anybody from the other team who comes into this square, it’s your job to put them on their butt. You got that? He proceeded to do the same with the other four lineman and the two linebackers.’

When I tense up over what needs to be done on a global scale, I need to remember that I am not assigned the whole planet. I have been entrusted with a particular slice of it. This is the portion of the world for which one day God will hold me accountable.”

This week will now be full of opportunities to make God’s love real in the lives of those around you. First, I pray that you will see those opportunities. Second, I pray that you will seize those opportunities by doing the loving thing, by doing the daring thing. And may somebody see Jesus in a whole new way through you.

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