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For Sunday January 22 — Last Updated 1/10/12

Better Broken: POWER

What Should We Do?” Acts 2:36-47; 1:8 (Titus 3:3-7)

Kernel Ideas:

Let’s be honest, at some point along the way, most of us have made a mess of things … in our relationships, our job, our families, our church, our finances, our marriages … we’ve done what’s shamed us, embarrassed us, demoralized us.

But God gives us something precious and powerful to deal with these times of failure and His call to do great things: baptism. Jesus called it being "born from above by the Holy Spirit" (John 3:3-7). Or as the apostle Paul says it, we were "cleansed; you were made holy; you were made right with God by calling on the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God" (1 Corinthians 6:11 nlt). God "saved us, not because of the righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy. He washed away our sins, giving us a new birth and new life through the Holy Spirit. He generously poured out the Spirit upon us through Jesus Christ our Savior. Because of his grace he declared us righteous and gave us confidence that we will inherit eternal life” (Titus 3:5-7).

And beyond baptism, through baptism, behind the gift of baptism, and the focus of Jesus and the early disciples on baptism is the power of the Holy Spirit and the forgiveness of our sins. It is about our trust in God's power through the gift of Jesus to change everything! We become a new person who is given a new creation (2 Corinthians 5:17) because the old person has died with Christ and our new person has been raised with Christ (Romans 6:3-5) to live for God by the power of God (Colossians 1:12-13).

We are reminded that we can have a fresh start, a clean slate, a life marker to look back upon and confidently know we are God’s child, we’ve been forgiven, and we face life and its challenges, we greet God’s opportunities, with Holy Spirit power. And this power is the final key in unleashing the powerful work of God in us and through us in our time!

1. Call on folks to be baptized
2. Call to pray for the release of the power of God’s forgiveness and the Holy Spirit in our lives, our families, and our church — especially have an elder read Ephesians 1:17-20 and then lead us in praying together Ephesians 3:14-21

For Sunday January 22 — Last Updated 1/10/12

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