How we serve
Acts 3:6 “Then Peter said, “Silver or gold I do not have, but what I do have I give you. In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, walk.” NIV
As I read this section this morning I am reminded of how we serve. Peter and John didn’t have what the man wanted. They were poor leaders trying to follow Christ faithfully. It wasn’t what they had, but what Jesus had. They learned the secret of serving through Jesus’ power. It wasn’t their own strength. It was reliance on Jesus.
This reminds of Henri Nouwen‘s powerful book Wounded Healer. We do not minister out of personal strength or our cleverness or our intellectual prowess. We come empty. We come beat up. We come weak. Yet through Christ we can do good things for God’s glory.
Groups Guy 
What a change in Peter and John ! A few weeks earlier Peter denied Jesus 3 times, but then they spent 40 days with Jesus as He talked about the promise from the Father where His followers would receive spiritual power. Then, they saw the Ascension of Christ, and heard from 2 angels about things to come, and 120 men and women went to the Upper Room where they received the Holy Spirit.
Peter gives the sermon of all sermons and 3,000 are saved. They were definitely different, and did the things Jesus did.
All the glory went to Jesus, and they used the miracles performed in His name to call the Jews to repentance.
It is a huge change. I have seen that. When on our own, nothing. But with the spirit wow look out.
It seems we receive less when there’s outside things distracting us. Jesus refers to this in John 14:26-27; the peace He left for us is as He gives us, not as the world influences us. The spirit can bring things to our mind and comfort us if we have our minds on Him.
I’ve been thinking that too Tim. Our souls need to listening much more to God and his word than too the world. It is so hard for us to shut the world out. We have things we must attend to, things we enjoy, things that bug us, things scare us. These things compete for the word that the Lord wishes to speak to us. Thanks for the reminder.
One of my favorite scriptures: Isaiah 26:3…
I memorized in NIV when I was in college. I still remember places I was at when I was repeating it.