One of our instructors recently gave us an assignment to study the word and find what we have. She used Acts 3 v 6 'Silver and Gold have I none; but such as I have give I thee...' What do we have to give?
The thoughts that immediately came to mind for me were what we have in Christ; righteousness, grace, love faith etc. As I started to study this out I looked at scriptures about these things:
Eph 4v7 - We have the gift of grace
Eph 4v24 We have a new man, created in the image of God in holiness and righteousness
Eph 5v8 - We have light, Children of light
Eph 5v30 - We have membership of the body of Christ
Eph 6 - We have the amour of God
Phil 4 v13 - We have strength to do all things through Christ
And my list went on...
But then God lead me to the key to all these things and what Acts 3 v 6 was actually talking about. All of these are gifts we have in Christ 1 Cor 1 v 6 'Even as the testimony of Christ was confirmed in you: 7 so that you come behind in no gift; waiting for the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ' v 18 ' For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness; but unto us which are saved it is the power of God'
Rom 1 v 16 ' For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation...'
What we really have is the power of the gospel of Christ, the truth of His word, the hope of His calling, righteousness in Him, a destiny, assured future - all this is the gospel message. It gives life, brings hope, heals the broken-hearted, brings health to flesh. It is a message of Love, Joy & Peace. It is a message that lives on the inside of us when we are born-again, it is confirmed in us.
We are who we are because of the hope of the gospel, that is what we have to share; I believe when Peter said 'Silver and gold have I none; but such as I have give I thee...' he was talking about the message of the gospel, that is why he went on to say '...in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth rise up & walk.' We don't have the power to heal but if we will open our mouth and let out what God has placed inside us, we will see the sick healed, the dead raised, the broken-hearted restored and much more! We have many things in Christ, but the key to what we have to share is the message of the gospel - that is where the power is. We have Christ living on the inside of us and that is the confirmation of His gospel.
Hi Katie,
I love this word, God gives us so much through the gifts he has given to us to build the church and restore it to it's full glory. I do believe though that we do have the power to heal, when God gives us the gift of healing He empowers us to go out and heal people so that they may see signs, miracles and wonders. God wants us to show the world His net breaking boat sinking fruitfulness that comes from a relationship with God and His son Lord Jesus Christ.
God bless
Paul
Posted by: Paul France | December 03, 2006 at 12:43 AM
Amen to that Paul, we do have the power to heal the sick, but it is only because of the price that Jesus paid at calvary for our sicknesses. It is His power through us, we have to first have Christ living on the inside of us. Through sharing with people the power of the gospel we will definately see signs, wonders and miracles - which was the title of the class in which we were looking at this scripture.
Posted by: Katie | December 10, 2006 at 03:17 AM
God wants us to show the world His net breaking boat sinking fruitfulness that comes from a relationship with God and His son Lord Jesus Christ.
Posted by: Juno888 | July 04, 2007 at 02:14 AM