PT-2 "Spiritual Mission"

 

SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 2/10/2018 12:06 PM

My Worship Time                                                                        Focus:  PT-2 “Spiritual Mission”

Bible Reading & Meditation                                                 Reference:  Acts 13:2b-5

            Message of the verses:  “the Holy Spirit said, "Set apart for Me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them." 3 Then, when they had fasted and prayed and laid their hands on them, they sent them away.  4 So, being sent out by the Holy Spirit, they went down to Seleucia and from there they sailed to Cyprus. 5 When they reached Salamis, they began to proclaim the word of God in the synagogues of the Jews; and they also had John as their helper.”

            We want to begin by looking at verse three “when they had fasted and prayed and laid their hands on them.”  I have mentioned that when you see fasting in the Word of God you very often see praying going along with the fasting.  One goes with the other as when you fast, and when I talk about fasting I believe that a true fast consists of only drinking water, and when you do that it helps to cleanse your body, and your body does not have to go through what takes the most energy and that is digesting your food.  I have also mentioned that once you fast for a total of three days you are not hungry until your body tells you to eat and that is when you need to eat.  We read the following from Matthew 4:1 “Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. 2 And after He had fasted forty days and forty nights, He then became hungry.” Notice the highlighted part of verse four as after Jesus had fasted for forty days and nights He then became hungry and this meant that His fast was complete.  I do not believe that Jesus went that long without water as one can only go about three days without liquids.  Jesus was the perfect human being as He was born without a sin nature like every other person is born with, and to me that means His body was perfect.  I have read that people have fasted for ninety days, drinking only water before they became hungry again, but Jesus became hungry after forty days and nights of fasting.  When you fast and as mentioned you body is actually repairing itself while you do this your thinking is much sharper and so your prayer life is better and that is why fasting and prayer go together. 

            Now we want to talk about how the leaders of the church at Antioch laid their hands on Saul and Barnabas, and this does not mean that they did not have the Holy Spirit, as both had already received the Holy Spirit when they became born-again.  John MacArthur writes “The laying on of hands simply signified identification, confirmation, and unity in their upcoming mission (cf. Num. 8:10; 27:18-23).”  “10 and present the Levites before the LORD; and the sons of Israel shall lay their hands on the Levites.”  “18 So the LORD said to Moses, "Take Joshua the son of Nun, a man in whom is the Spirit, and lay your hand on him; 19 and have him stand before Eleazar the priest and before all the congregation, and commission him in their sight. 20 “You shall put some of your authority on him, in order that all the congregation of the sons of Israel may obey him. 21 “Moreover, he shall stand before Eleazar the priest, who shall inquire for him by the judgment of the Urim before the LORD. At his command they shall go out and at his command they shall come in, both he and the sons of Israel with him, even all the congregation." 22 Moses did just as the LORD commanded him; and he took Joshua and set him before Eleazar the priest and before all the congregation. 23 Then he laid his hands on him and commissioned him, just as the LORD had spoken through Moses.” 

            After the leaders laid their hands on Saul and Barnabas they sent them away.  John MacArthur writes “A better translation of apoluo (sent them away” might be ‘they let them go,’ or ‘they released them.’)  It is clear from verse one that the Spirit, not the church sent out the two missionaries.  Since He had already sent them, all the church could do was cut the cord and let them go.  That truth is repeated in verse four, where Luke relates that the missionaries were ‘sent out by the Holy Spirit.’”

            My plans are to finish looking at the rest of this section in our next SD.

            Spiritual meaning for my life today:  The New Testament tells us in different places “when you fast” and this says that believers should be fasting from time to time.  One can fast by skipping a meal and take that time to praying, or one can determine that they need to get closer to the Lord and do a water only fast for a longer time.  This happens when perhaps you have a crisis or desire to take time to pray about something that the Lord has placed on your mind to pray about.

My Steps of Faith for Today:  Trust that the Lord will be with me in a special way as I teach on the church at Laodicea tomorrow in our Sunday school class.

Memory verse:  Psalm 143:10 “Teach me to do Your will, For You are my God; Let Your good Spirit lead me on level ground.”

Answer to yesterday’s Bible question:  “Their on the cross” (Luke 23:42).

Today’s Bible question:  “In what city did Paul meet some Epicureans and Stoics?”

Answer in our next SD.

2/10/2018 12:40 PM