Some considerable time ago we began a series
in our morning worship, which we entitled, From
Simon to Peter.
What we have before us this morning is
a continuation of that series, though we have
not billed it as such.
Because we find that when we come to
the book of the Acts of the Apostles,
very especially, we see the emerging new man,
that Jesus Christ promised in the very initial
stages of his encounter with Peter, that he
would ultimately be.
You remember those words recorded in chapter 1
of John's Gospel?
So you, Simon, son of Jonas, you shall
be called Peter.
And Peter means something quite different from Simon.
Whatever the precise significance of the two names,
they are certainly as different as chalk from
cheese.
Simon is going to be transformed into a
new man, and that man is going to
be a man of rock, stable, firm, strong
in spirit to serve his Lord.
Now, it is when we cross over from
the closing words of the Gospels into the
book of the Acts of the Apostles that
we see this new image appearing.
We certainly see the beginnings of that in
this very remarkable second chapter in the book
of the Acts of the Apostles.
The aspect of the new man that we
are going to be concerned with today comes
out under the title we have given, The
Holy Spirit and Peter's Personality.
What we see here in substance is the
way in which the Spirit of God dealt
with the individual man, Simon Peter, and so
changed him and transformed him and then graced
him, that he was not only able to
take his place in the community, but able
to fulfill his mission there.
Not simply able to become a member of
the church, but to take his place as
a member and as a leader, and within
the fellowship of that Christian community to do
exactly what God had planned for him.
Now this is grace.
This is nothing short of the grace of
God.
And it is to this that we turn
this morning.
Now I am not therefore basing the message
this morning on any particular text.
I suppose if we were asked to take
any one text more than another, I would
refer you to the opening words of verse
14.
The Peter standing up with the eleven.
Now I think there is more there than
a statement that Peter and the eleven were
standing together in a group.
That is true, they were.
They were shoulder to shoulder, man to man,
in the battle for the gospel.
But there is more to it than that.
They were not simply standing shoulder to shoulder,
but they stood heart with heart.
Soul knitted to soul.
They stood as one man in the fellowship
which the Spirit had brought about and the
word of the gospel.
In other words, here is an integrated, united,
concerted effort to move forward in the way
of the Lord.
Our Lord's last few days on earth, ere
he ascended to the Father, were days of
very mixed feelings, we believe, for the community
that he was going to leave behind.
Of course they knew that their Lord had
not died in vain.
Because they had seen him, they knew that
he was risen from the dead.
And the resurrection assured them that the death
of Calvary was not the unmitigated tragedy that
they once thought it to be.
He was risen.
But there were many questions.
They were still perplexed by the fact that
he had announced earlier on that he was
going away, he was going to leave them,
and that this was to their profit.
Now had he simply said, I'm going away,
well, that would have been bad, as far
as they were concerned, in their present understanding
of things.
But he insisted that it was to their
profit that he should leave them.
And this, of course, was mystifying.
And then, over and above all that, he
had told them exactly what they were to
do.
They were to be witnesses, even to the
uttermost parts of the earth, but beginning at
Jerusalem.
They were to make disciples of all nations
and so forth.
You remember that he had told them exactly
what they were to do, in terms of
mission.
And they felt so impotent, so utterly incapable,
even of setting out upon that ministry.
Now it was not without reason, therefore, that
our Lord commanded them to remain in Jerusalem
until, as he put it, you shall receive
the promise of the Father, about which I
have talked so much.
He spoke of it as the promise of
the Father, which you have heard of me,
Acts 1-4.
Then he proceeded to describe it as their
being baptized with the Holy Spirit.
And then, in verse 8 of this first
chapter of Acts, as their reception of power.
He shall receive power.
After that, the Holy Spirit comes upon you.
Then, in due course, the event took place.
The day of Pentecost arrived.
And with the arrival of the day came
the Spirit of God down upon that ancient
community in a manner which was wholly singular
and unique.
Down he came.
I'm not going into the details this morning,
but what I do want us to notice
again is this, that when he came down,
the promise of power was fulfilled.
Now, we have considered one aspect of that
power already.
Namely, the power of the Spirit over Peter's
mouth or Peter's tongue.
It wasn't, of course, exclusively Peter's experience.
It was the experience of the whole community.
The Holy Spirit of God controlled their organ
of speech.
This is our most remarkable thing.
It's only the grace of God and the
power of God can do this.
You and I know what an unruly thing
the tongue is.
How many lives bear marks and wounds here
this morning because of other people's tongues.
But the mighty power of God came upon
Peter, came upon his friends, and one thing
that took place was this, their mouths, their
tongues, their lips came under divine control.
So that what they said, they said as
the Spirit required it.
The way they said it, they said it
as the Spirit required it.
So that at one moment they could speak
in this language, in another, in yet another
language.
But the point to notice is this, not
the languages that were used, but the control
of the Spirit, the power of the Spirit
over men and women's mouths and tongues and
lips.
But now, the Holy Spirit's power was not
to be confined to his control of men's
tongues, however mighty, however significant and far-reaching
that was, first of all for that community
there in Jerusalem, and for the remaining of
the Church's history.
But the Spirit's power is equally evident in
this, that he is able to deal with
the several individuals that comprise that community and
fit their personalities so that they can take
their place in the community.
We, of course, have a special interest in
Peter, but what we're saying is true of
all of them.
It is almost unbelievable the way in which
these folk were fused into what we so
glibly call a fellowship, a communion, in which
heart beat with heart, mind thought with mind,
and their wills were all under subjection to
the holy, perfect will of God.
Neither is this powerful ministry of the Spirit
any the less important than the power evidenced
in the gift of tongues which he imparted
to the members of that church.
You see, the ability to communicate the good
news in other tongues that we have in
the day of Pentecost, all that could have
come to nothing had the early Christian community
began to quarrel among themselves, had they started
bickering and bantering and dividing and arguing, something
which is so often met in the Christian
church.
I say to you that the whole message
of Pentecost preached in many tongues could have
come to naught were it not for the
power of the Spirit dealing with this personality
and that individual and blending them and making
them into one cohesive organ for God to
work through.
Now this is especially, especially relevant to Peter
because Peter's personality was not an easy one,
not easy for other people to get on
with.
We've seen this all along the way.
Pardon me for having to refer to some
of these very basic passages again this morning.
He was an individualist.
He was a man who was impetuous.
He acted first and then he thought afterwards.
Peter never saw other people's feet, never thought
of other people's cons, he just stepped on
them.
He was a man like that.
He was a rough, rugged individual.
He just instinctively acted and if he saw
that he wanted to get there, doesn't matter
who's in the way, away he goes.
That's Simon Peter.
Now I say to you that to get
a man like that to fit into the
community and to fulfill his mission without hurting
other people, no, not negatively without hurting other
people, but in the process of becoming what
God meant him to be, to bring others
with him that they may all grow in
grace and in the knowledge of God, is
token of nothing short of sheer divine power.
So what we have before us this morning
then is the power of the Holy Spirit
dealing with men's personality.
Now my good people, before we go any
further, let us say this.
Our interest in this is not purely historical.
I suppose it would deserve our attention as
history.
But our interest in this is very practical.
You see, you and I belong to a
church.
You know the kind of temperament that you
have.
You know how you get on with people.
There may be someone in this church this
morning you don't like looking at, you never
sat with.
I want to tell you that there is
an answer to that and that a real
koinonia of God can emerge even where people
have been opposite to one another.
But it is only by the Holy Spirit's
grace and power.
He can fit Peter, the most difficult character,
into the fellowship so that Peter comes to
himself, as it were, and matures spiritually.
And at the same time, all those around
him grow in grace and in the knowledge
of God in Christ.
Now this is power.
I want to say three things this morning
and though we're concentrating upon Peter we have
to look at the others as well.
The first thing is this.
The Holy Spirit enabled Peter so to master
his personality or should I say his personality
problems that he became integrated into the community
of believers.
Now this is the basic thing.
We'll move on from there afterwards.
The Holy Spirit enabled Peter so to master
his personality problems or idiosyncrasies that he became
integrated to the Christian community.
He did not simply have his name on
the list.
I don't suppose they had a list.
But he belonged.
He belonged to them and they belonged to
him.
And this is what Christian fellowship is all
about.
You know, it's one thing to have our
membership on the role of a church, but
that's not what it's all about.
Christian fellowship is something way beyond this.
It is that those within the fellowship belong
to one another.
We say that the Lord is ours and
we are his.
Well now that's wonderful.
But Christian fellowship implies this also.
You are mine and I am yours in
Christ.
And we don't know anything about it until
we get there.
Until we can look into the faces of
one another, those whose names are on the
roll and we say to one another in
Christ, as honest as the day, man, woman
in Christ, I'm yours.
And you're mine.
So then I would say that there is
more to this 14th verse in Acts 2
than a statement that they were physically together.
Geographically in the same place.
They were more than that.
Their hearts were in it.
Their minds were under the sway of divine
truth and they were under the sovereign control
of the Holy Spirit.
Now just a moment's thought.
This matter of becoming integrated in a community
is a two-sided affair.
It makes demands upon the incoming individual and
upon those that are there to receive him.
The two sides.
Upon the individual and the community of which
he is becoming a part.
There must be considerable give and take on
both sides.
And especially so when that community is as
yet in its infancy as the church here
in Jerusalem was.
And when it had so recently passed through
the emotionally traumatic experiences related to the crucifixion
of our Lord.
You see they were somewhat emotionally tense still.
Oh how much give and take there has
to be if the membership is to become
a fellowship.
Be it to the everlasting credit of that
early community that they learned to receive Peter.
To receive Peter as one of their members
despite his history of bluster and failure.
Now mark this.
No one knew the failure and the blustering
nature of Peter better than these folk.
They'd lived with him for the best part
of three and a half years.
It was on their cons that he had
so often stepped.
He'd been such a nuisance along the way.
They had been a thousand times hurt by
his awkward words and awkward ways.
I sometimes think that their task was not
unlike that of trying to fit a completely
outrageous stone into a building such as this.
You imagine yourself trying to build a wall
and all the stones are very much of
the same size.
But then there comes one mammoth, rough, rugged,
untuned stone, untrimmed.
And you try to fit that into a
wall.
Peter was a man like that.
He wasn't made to measure.
He wasn't exactly like anybody else.
He was rough.
He was himself.
He was an individual.
Very much so.
Now how to fit him into the community?
Looked at from Peter's side, the task was
no less challenging.
He knew how his tongue could get out
of control.
He knew himself how often he acted out
of turn.
I'm sure he'd had the same kind of
thing happen when he was on the boat
fishing.
I'm sure there must have been lacerated spirits
among those who joined him.
But you see, now, he and his fellows
are right in the center of the picture.
Everybody's looking on.
There are more people around in the team,
as it were.
It's not just two or three on a
fishing boat.
There's a crowd and they're all so different.
And the eyes of all are focused upon
this group.
I say to you, it must have been
very difficult for Peter to become integrated and
to become part of this community.
But God be praised.
God be praised.
However different they were, however varied in temperament
and personality and make of this, that, and
the other, however varied they were, the Spirit
of God so came upon them and so
gave them power that these men were able
to control themselves.
The fact is that up until Pentecost, these
followers of our Lord were very much unitary
believers.
Of course, they were together in the sense
that they were all following the same Lord,
listening to the same teaching, coming under the
same influence.
And he would have put them into the
same category as followers or disciples of Jesus
Christ.
But they were very much each man for
himself.
Sometimes two or three of them would act
together.
At other times they would be sent out
two by two.
But despite all that, you see the marks
of individuality very strongly here.
But at Pentecost, something new came into existence.
What characterizes the Church after Pentecost is not
each man for himself, but each for other.
They were now an organism.
Not like beads on a string, all on
the same string, but not related, not fused
the one into the other.
But they were now like branches of the
vine.
They shared the same life.
And they belonged together part-wise and head
-wise and in every other sense.
Indeed, they even brought their material goods and
fooled them.
You see, whatever you make of that, it
meant that they belonged to one another.
This was fellowship.
If I may put it in terms of
Ezekiel's vision of the dry bones, not only
were the bones now brought closely together as
Ezekiel puts it, bone to its bone.
That's marvelous.
Each person fitting into his proper place, bone
to its bone.
But the whole body was animated by the
one Holy Spirit.
They had the same life.
And they belonged to one another.
Just like the members of the physical body
belonged one to the other, they became an
organism.
My good friends, do we know anything of
this?
I guess this morning, and I hope you
don't get cross with me for saying this,
I guess most of us are members of
the Church.
We've got our names on the register somewhere.
We've been received unofficially somewhere.
My friend, I have a question to ask
you.
It is far more relevant than that.
More basic, more fundamental.
Do you belong to the saints?
Do you belong?
Just as my hand belongs to my arm
and my arm to my body, do you
belong to the saints?
Is there a political group, for example, to
which you belong more than to the Church?
Or any other entity in life to which
you belong?
I say to you, if that is so,
then your alleged Christian experience needs to be
scrutinized very, very carefully.
Peter, by the grace of God and the
power of the Spirit, was able to master
his personality problems and idiosyncrasies in such a
manner that even he felt himself to be
one of, to belong to, the community.
Secondly, the Spirit's power enabled Peter to assume
his destined role of leadership without causing a
rupture of the fellowship.
Now this takes us further on a little
along the road.
Simon Peter was not simply called to be
a member of the Christian Church.
He was that.
But he was called to be a leader.
And he was both naturally endowed and spiritually
equipped to serve the Church of Jesus Christ.
But you see, a crucial question is this.
Can such a man as Peter win the
confidence of his fellows so that they concede
to him the place of leadership without bringing
harm and despise to the fellowship?
Has he got a rule with a rod
of iron and impose himself as God's man
upon the people?
Or is there some way whereby the people
can recognize him as the man who has
been called to leadership and concede to him
honorably and gratefully the position to which God
called him?
Now the answer to that question, of course,
is clear.
This kind of thing can only take place
by the power of the Spirit of God
upon Peter himself and upon the community.
And what we have here, of course, is
the token and the evidence of the fact
that the Spirit's power was so mighty upon
them all.
The other eleven looked up and they saw
Yeshua as God's man.
And they conceded him the place that was
his due.
And Simon Peter did not override or roughly
ride over them but dealt with them as
the Lord's people, his sheep, his lamb.
Be it to the eternal glory of that
initial nucleus of believers then that they recognized
Peter's gifts and calling as surely as they
saw his faults.
Now I have to repeat.
If anyone was aware of Peter's faults these
were the people because they'd lived with him
for over three years.
Therefore, you see, you know what happens if
people do anything wrong in your eyes.
Those wrongs, those faults, those sins, they linger
on and so often you can't see those
people again through your concept of their faults
and feebleness and sins and waywardness.
Now you see, had that happened here Peter
would never have been leader.
Never.
They were there.
They knew how he denounced his Lord and
denied him.
They knew how he blasphemed.
They knew how all along the way Peter
had been a stumbling block and Jesus had
to say to him, get thee behind me,
Satan.
They knew the arrogance of this man.
They knew the impetuosity of this man.
They knew his faults.
And therefore, you see, on the natural plane
one can almost imagine it's not necessary natural
for the other people to stake their claims
to leadership.
After all, they didn't go the length that
he did.
None of them cursed and swore and said
three times over we don't know the person
you're talking about.
None of them.
Peter did.
But the same disciples also heard Jesus reinstate
Simon.
Most of them, if not all of them,
were there around that charcoal fire by the
side of the Sea of Galilee and they
heard the same Lord of the church say
to him Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou
me?
And when Simon was able to acknowledge that
he had some measure of real affection for
the Savior three times over Jesus said to
him, right Simon, I've not abandoned you but
I'm reiterating take charge of my sheep and
the lambs and feed my sheep.
In other words, I'm reinstating you.
Now, this is where grace comes in, you
see.
They knew Simon's faults.
They knew Simon's sins.
And yet they allowed the calling of God
to override every other consideration and did not
stand in the way of Simon becoming their
leader because the Lord had placed him there.
This is unnecessary grace in the life of
a church.
It is so possible to allow people's faults
to blind us to everything else.
I was reading the other day about Martin
Luther.
It comes out so clearly in him.
Now, this is not the picture we have
of Luther from some people nowadays.
Luther is anything but good, according to people.
And there was great grace upon that great
man and we thank God for him from
this pulpit this morning and I trust from
the pew.
One of the great facets of Martin Luther's
understanding and spiritual perception lies here.
He knew what God had called him to
do and he set out to do that.
Though there be as many devils in worms
as there are tiles on the housetops, he'll
go to worms.
But the same Martin Luther will not try
to do what belongs to someone else.
Now, this is the quote.
Philip Melanchthon was a great scholar, far greater
than Luther, and probably a far more charming
man.
If the two came in here this morning
and appeared before you, I have no doubt
that all of us would fall for Philip
Melanchthon.
He was such a perfect gentleman.
You know, he would capture everybody.
It doesn't matter what your background is.
He was that type of man.
Martin Luther was rough.
If he knew your faults, your sins, and
mine, he would probably tell us face to
face.
He would not hold his punches.
He was a little bit of John the
Baptist.
But now this is what Martin Luther said.
I, he said, was born to be a
rough controversialist.
I clear the ground.
I like this humility, you know.
I clear the ground.
I was called to pull up the weeds,
to fill up the ditches, and to smooth
the roads for the royal carriage.
But to build, and to plan, and to
sow, and to water, and to adorn the
country for God belongs by the grace of
God to Philip Melanchthon.
That's exactly what we have here.
There were times when Martin Luther might have
been jealous of Melanchthon because of his popularity.
But no, no, no, no, no.
He saw the grace of God in Melanchthon,
the calling of God in Melanchthon, and he
knew what he was called to do.
So he was satisfied with his own and
acknowledged God's calling to his brother.
That's exactly what we have here.
Even Simon Peter was given this grace.
As you, as we acknowledge the power and
grace of the Spirit in the early church,
conceding his place to Peter, let us not
miss the complimentary gift in him.
I see him standing with the eleven, not
apart from them, not preaching down at them,
not separating himself from them as the leader
standing on a pedestal.
No, no.
He is actually carrying them with him, winning
their confidence so that what is done by
the one is done in the name of
the whole body, and they are behind him
as he is with them.
You see, at last, something big has taken
place.
The impetuous, proud, arrogant Peter has been mustered
for God.
Thus, Peter fulfilled his role of leadership without
disturbing the fellowship.
He carried them with him.
He won them over, and they were won.
My good friends, what a different story the
history of the Christian church would make if
the Spirit of God had been as evident
at all times.
Lastly, the Spirit enabled Peter to break away
from his native timidity and pass forward toward
his appointed destiny.
I don't know how you find it, but
I find myself, as you will have noticed
from these sermons, I find myself always remembering
some of Peter's thoughts.
Some of them always come to mind.
But there are some things in Peter which
we strangely forget, even sometimes don't recognize.
I was amazed, after spending quite a little
time in studying gospel narratives as they present
the story and the picture of Simon Peter,
I was amazed how I had missed, for
example, one very, very obvious trait, when you
look back upon it, in Peter's life, namely,
his native timidity, a streak of fear.
Have you noticed it?
Now, it may well be this morning that
when I say this, it strikes some of
you as being not true to fact.
Well, now you read the gospels again.
I want to say to you that despite
all the blustering of Peter and despite all
the apparently courageous things he did, most of
those courageous deeds were wrought out of sheer
impetuosity, instinctively rather than thoughtfully, because underneath all
that there were basic fears.
Yes, the very man who has been called
the big fisherman was afraid of certain things,
overwhelmed by the phenomena of his talkativeness and
impetuous activity.
We find it difficult to recognize this perhaps,
but you know, this is not the first
time that a man has been quick in
action and quick to speak, only to cover
up a basic fear.
Now, this is true.
When there are people in church or people
in committees or anywhere else, and you know,
they're always quick out, they're like a gun,
they're off.
Be careful.
Sometimes they're very torrent of words, hides of
fear, and something else as well, maybe.
Well, it was true of Peter.
Without now enlarging upon the details, let me
just remind you of a threefold fear which
the Gospels relate to.
And they're also very relevant to his fulfillment
of his ministry and his destiny.
First of all, Peter was afraid of drowning.
Afraid of drowning.
If you remember the story, it's in Matthew
14.
Now, I'm not concerned with all the details.
A little group had been caught in a
storm on the Sea of Galilee.
Jesus was not with them.
He was watching, he was praying on the
slopes over there, and he could see them
in the moonlight, he could see them toiling
and rowing, and at long last, when they
thought they couldn't cope, the Lord Jesus in
sovereign power walked on the waves and made
towards them.
They were there caught in this little boat,
heaving upwards and downwards at the mercy of
the sea and its storm.
And then they saw this unrecognized figure at
first coming towards them, and my, their fears
were doubled.
What's this ghost figure coming near to us?
And he, out of the grace of his
heart, said, it's all right, it's me, it
is I.
Simon Peter, impetuous as usual and always the
first to speak, said, well, Lord, if it
is you, let me put you to the
test.
You see, if he'd thought about this, he'd
never have done it.
But impetuous, he said it.
Look, Lord, if it is you, bid me
come to you on the water and enable
me to do the same kind of thing
as you can do.
And the Lord said, come.
And Peter, without thinking, of course, walked out,
out in obedience to his Lord's command.
And believe it or not, Peter was able
to walk on the sea like his Lord
until he saw the waves.
And he took his eyes away from his
Lord and his heart away from his Lord
and his faith away from his Lord.
And he was beginning to sink.
But he's a fisherman.
He's a swimmer.
He's a man of the sea.
Surely Peter has mustered all fear of the
briny ocean or the Sea of Galilee?
Not at all.
Save me, he says, like a baby in
the water.
I'm sinking.
He was afraid to sink, afraid of drowning.
May I give you another fear of his?
Not only was he afraid of drowning, he
was afraid of the deriding of others.
Very familiar scene.
It's the high priest's courtyard.
Peter has followed afar off, and he's got
there just after his Lord.
And as the high priest and his puppets
are attending to the cross-examination of the
Lord Jesus on that fateful night, Simon is
in the other courtyard.
And you remember how a little girl comes
in and says, well, weren't you also with
them?
Peter denied three times.
Why?
You know, basically because he was afraid of
their derision.
There may have been other factors involved here,
but I suggest to you that basically he
was a man who couldn't take people laughing
at him.
He couldn't stand, he couldn't face the mob
laughing and having a good time.
What, you, the follower of a man who
is now at the mercy of the leaders,
who's soon been nailed to a cross?
You, a follower of his?
He couldn't take it.
Afraid of drowning, afraid of derision.
And of course he was afraid of declaring
the unpalatable truth when it ought to be
declared.
That is up until this point.
That is brought out in John chapter 20,
verse 19, when joining others on that first
day of the week when Jesus was risen.
We read that they were in the room
when the doors were shut for fear of
the Jews.
They knew that their Lord was risen.
They knew it.
And imagine Simon Peter, who knew that his
Lord was risen, this big, burly man.
He was afraid to declare it.
What will happen to us if we go
out into the streets of Jerusalem at this
time and tell the Jews that the one
they nailed on the cross is the Lord
of glory risen from the dead?
He was afraid, you see.
But that fear was to be short-lived
when the spirit of Pentecost came upon him
and his family.
Ye shall receive power after that the Holy
Ghost has come upon you.
I see the doors opening and I see
the community moving out into the streets of
Jerusalem, careless now of what might happen, be
it drowning, be it dying, be it cross,
be it anything.
Life has assumed something entirely different now.
Whether in life or in death, they are
at their Lord's disposal.
Fear of man and fear of death has
gone.
How to move forward with destiny.
Men and women, what has God called you
to?
I wonder whether there is someone here this
morning who is laboring under an awful burden.
God has called you to something.
And you're afraid to move forward.
Don't be ashamed of it for a moment.
Peter was, too, during the days of his
training.
But when the Spirit of God filled him,
he went out.
Not like Abram, not knowing whither he went
because the Lord had told him that one
day he would be bound and would be
martyred.
But he lived under that shadow henceforth by
the power of the Spirit and marched forward
to his destiny.
Now the word with which I must close
is this.
The Holy Spirit of God has not changed.
Hallelujah.
Our God is the great I Am.
And the Holy Spirit is the great I
Am.
And it matters not what your need and
mine may be for you this morning.
He is able to enable us to fulfill
our destiny and our calling.
He is able to deal with us and
to chop off the rugged edges that we
may fit into the community.
He is able to make leaders assume leadership
without destroying the fellowship.
He is able to make us strong to
move forward to our destiny.
Despite all the fears and tyranny that may
have broken our hearts and silenced our tongues
in days that are gone, therefore we can
only end in one place.
Oh, Spirit of God, take control of us.
Will you pray that?
Is your heart open this morning?
Are all the windows of the temple of
your soul open towards Jerusalem?
Not open to receive anything from any evil
spirit that may be abroad, but open in
the name of Jesus for anything that God
has, that God has.
In other words, you and I prepare to
be under the control of the Spirit for
there will be no victory save insofar as
we are under His control.
Ride on, ride on in thou spirit of
the Lord.
Rule every territory here within this heart.
Let us pray.
Oh Lord, we pray thee to lead us
on, to teach us, making us teachable at
every turn of the road that the gospel
we declare from thy word may also be
the gospel whose power we experience within our
hearts and within our fellowship.
Mold us.
Transform us.
Deal with the oddities that belong to all
of us that we see in others but
rarely in ourselves and make of us such
a holy communion of saints that this shall
be an outpost of the heavenly Jerusalem, a
place where the King dwells in His beauty
and in His glory.
Amen.