ray choi

Christian husband, father of 3 and bi-vocational pastor

Acts 4: Should We Pray for Signs and Wonders?

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In Acts 4:29-30, the early church prayed for 2 things: 1) boldness to preach and 2) that the Lord would stretch out His hand for healing, signs and wonders. Should the church today be praying this same prayer?

Discussion Questions
– Here are some ways to read the OT: 1) civil/ceremonial/moral laws – only the moral laws in the OT are binding for us today; 2) old vs new covenant – Jesus didn’t come to abolish the Law and the Prophets but to fulfill them (i.e. murder/hatred, adultery/lust); 3) let the NT be the lens in which you read the OT (Hebrews – sacrificial system); 4) use your conscience as a guide (i.e. eating pork); 4) remember the law of love so as not to stumble your brothers and sisters (i.e. watching movies); 5) if you read about an important principle in the Bible, assume that it is still in effect unless the Bible tells us otherwise (i.e. tithing, rich young ruler). How does this pertain to the issue of whether or not we should be praying for healing, signs and wonders?
– Did the miraculous gifts die with the first century apostles? To answer that, read Acts 5:12 and Acts 6, focusing on the life of Stephen. What office did Stephen hold? What does this tell us about signs and wonders in the life of the church today? Are there present day apostles with an apostolic gifting? Or present day prophets with prophetic gifting?
– Acts 4:29-30. Why is it important to pray this way? The key verse of the entire book of Acts is Acts 1:8. We all know the marching orders of Jesus – Great Commission. Yet, why don’t we go out and make disciples? Is it a training issue? Is it because we don’t know what we need to be doing? Why don’t we love one another the way the early church did? Is it because we don’t know that we ought to love one another? Why do we fall short? It’s a power issue. We lack the boldness which comes when power descends from on high. Do you agree?
– To the early church that experienced a demonstration of the Spirit and God’s power, what did they pray for? To the early church that already witnessed healings (40 year old cripple walking) and signs and wonders (angel setting Peter and John free from prison), where miracles seemed rather mundane, what did they pray for?
– How does witnessing a healing or a sign or wonder serve 2 purposes, one for the non-believer and another for the believer?
– If you don’t care about lost souls and all that you care about is your own salvation (i.e. the Holy Spirit as a deposit), then you may never feel a need to pray Acts 4:29-30. But if you care about obeying Acts 1:8, then you will feel a desperate need to pray Acts 4:29-30. Do you agree?
– Let’s not put the Acts 2 church and the first century apostles on a pedestal. God is the same yesterday, today, forever. The gospel hasn’t changed. We have the same Holy Spirit and the same power is available to us. Do you agree that the Christians in the book of Acts are normative, meaning these are not special Christians in a certain era but these are “normal” Christians?
– Statistically, does the fact that conservative Christian denominations are decreasing in number but charismatic denominations are increasing tell us anything about missions and the role of the Spirit?
– One caution from Acts 5:17-18. The early church was demonized by the religious establishment. If the Lord releases healings, signs and wonders here at our church, others who do not share similar experiences, out of their jealousy, will dismiss us, diminish us, slander and ridicule us. How do you see this playing out already in churches across America?

Vision 2014: Hearts Ablaze (pt1 of 3)

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Text: Luke 24:13-32

Happy New Year!

At the beginning of the year, many churches come up with a vision statement. A vision, a focus, a goal for 2014. In some ways, it’s kind of a like doing resolutions. Many people come up with resolutions, things they want to do differently as they enter the new year. Usually, resolutions are admissions of areas didn’t go well in the previous year. If you ate too much greasy, fried food and the only exercise you got was running from the living room to the kitchen in 2013, then in 2014, you want to make changes–I’m going to eat less fried food, eat more vegetables, and exercise more. There would be no need to do a resolution in an area that you did well in last year.

For us at the Hill, for the past few years, the vision statement each and every year began with 3 ideas. The first 2 ideas come from Matt 22:34-40 [READ].

The first idea is based on the greatest commandment. What is the greatest commandment? To love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. The second idea is based on the second greatest command, love your neighbor as yourself. All the Law and the Prophets, in other words, the entire Old Testament can be boiled down to these 2 commands–love God and love neighbor.

The third idea comes from Matt 28:18-20 [READ].

The third idea is based on the Great Commission, which is God’s marching orders for the church and for every believer. We are to make disciples. The Greatest Commandment, the second greatest commandment and the Great Commission. Love God, love neighbor and make disciples. By now, many of you have heard me say these things several times.

All 3 are important, but of the 3, if you had to pick one to focus on, which one would you choose? What if you made loving neighbors the primary focus in 2014 and you neglected loving God? Or what if you made making disciples the primary focus ahead of loving God? Then, you might be busy and things might happen around you, but if loving God is not number one, then we run the risk of idolizing good works toward neighbors or discipleship or ministry. Serving others is a good thing, but unfortunately, there are many ministers who love the ministry more than they love God. Or they love helping their neighbors more than they love God. In other words, compared to their love for people, their love for God is small. Or they love investing in people and making disciples, but they don’t invest even half the amount of energy they do in disciple making in their own relationship with God.

Isn’t that backward? Shouldn’t God be first and shouldn’t we strive to love God first, with all our heart, soul, mind and strength? Then, love for neighbors and love for disciple making will flow out naturally from a person who loves God in this way, right? A healthy Christian will demonstrate growth in all 3 areas. There will be an ever growing love for God and this love will compel them to love neighbors and make disciples. It would be odd if someone spent hours and hours each day in the Word and in prayer and their cup overflowed internally and none of that spilled over and blessed the people around them. Love for God will, it should, translate to love for others.

But I think in our task-oriented, results-oriented, what-have-you-done-for-me-lately society, we inevitably drift toward loving neighbors and making disciples and we put God in the backseat. Because when you spend time with neighbors and love them, you see results. They ask questions, they come with you to church, they might even become fellow believers. This is great! Or when you invest in disciple making and the person you are investing in is spiritually hungry, you’re excited because you’re seeing results. You see their love for the Word growing. You see their prayer life deepening. You see them serving and discipling others. And these results are very satisfying for a minister who is spending his or her energy loving others.

But when it comes to our love for God, at least for me, results are harder to see. How can you quantify your love for God and know that it is growing? It’s not as tangible as a person in front of you in need. Yet, Scripture is clear. Loving God is the GREATEST commandment, it’s the most important commandment, it’s first in terms of priority because without the love of God, we have absolutely nothing in the tank to offer our neighbors or those interested in discipleship. The best we can offer is human love and human effort and these will not get you very far. The love of God is like water from a snow capped mountain that flows down the mountain into the surrounding valleys. The source of the water is at the top and it flows downhill to those in the surrounding valleys. God’s love is first because He’s our love source. When we are filled with the love of God, then it flows downhill and the love spills over to neighbors and disciples living in the valleys.

In 2014, how do we begin to love God with our heart, soul, mind and strength? I want to challenge you to love God in one simple way in this coming year. Read the Word. Not just this year but I want you to commit to doing this every year. Finish Scripture cover to cover within this year and when you are done, read it again from cover to cover. And do this for the rest of your life.

Specifically, I want to challenge you to read a minimum of 3 chapters of the Bible a day. Did you know that if you read 3 chapters a day, you can read the entire Bible in one year? If you want to push yourself and I want to push myself in 2014, then I highly encourage you to read 10 chapters a day. If you read 10 chapters a day, do you know how quickly you can read the entire Bible cover to cover? 4 months. At this pace, you can read the entire Bible 3 times within one year. There are Christians out there who devote themselves to the reading of Scripture, esp. at times when a critical decision needs to be made and they are seeking the will of God with all of their heart, soul, mind and strength and they read 40 chapters of the Bible in one day. If you read 40 chapters a day, you do the math. You can read the entire Bible from Genesis to Revelation in one month.

Some of you are looking overwhelmed. 3 chapters, or 10 chapters, no way! Impossible! Who has time for that? Be honest, who is thinking that right now? I want you to open your Bibles to Psalm 1. Put your finger there. Now turn the Bible to Psalm 10. Now hold up Psalm 1 to Psalm 10. This is nothing! This is less than the Sunday paper. It will take you 30 minutes. Can’t you spare 30 minutes in a day to read God’s Word?

Matt 24 – End Times: Missions, Faithful Service, Perseverance, and Watchful Readiness (pt3 of 3)

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Here are some Tier 1 applications. Two are public applications (how we treat others) and two are personal (how we prepare ourselves to meet the coming Christ).

1) The Importance of Evangelism and Missions

14 This good news of the kingdom will be proclaimed in all the world as a testimony to all nations. And then the end will come.

Jesus left us with the Great Commission and he expects us to go to all nations preaching the good news of the kingdom. And it sounds almost like, once every nation has heard the good news, then the end will come. The question is, how many people groups are left who have never heard the gospel? If you define people groups to be ethnic, linguistic peoples without reference to country boundaries, then there’s about 10,000 remaining. If all Christians and all churches got serious about the Great Commission, we could reach every last group in our lifetime. In light of the imminent day of the Lord, we at the Hill have to do our part to reach those who haven’t been reached.

This relates to our next public application–

2) Faithful Service

45 “Who then is a faithful and sensible slave, whom his master has put in charge of his household, to give them food at the proper time? 46 That slave whose master finds him working when he comes will be rewarded. 47 I assure you: He will put him in charge of all his possessions. 48 But if that wicked slave says in his heart, ‘My master is delayed,’ 49 and starts to beat his fellow slaves, and eats and drinks with drunkards, 50 that slave’s master will come on a day he does not expect and at an hour he does not know. 51 He will cut him to pieces and assign him a place with the hypocrites. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

A wicked slave thinks, my master is delayed. He won’t be back for a while. It’s like at work, your boss is out of the office so you relax a bit. This wicked slave relaxes a bit too much. Not only does he eat and drink with drunkards, he just wants to enjoy life and have a good time, but also, this wicked slave mistreats and even beats the other slaves.

Then, the master suddenly appears at the door. He sees the drunkenness and he sees the pain inflicted on the other slaves and the master takes the slave whom he entrusted and throws him into a place where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth. In light of the imminent day of the Lord, let’s serve our master faithfully and treat each other lovingly.

Now we get to the personal applications.

3) The Importance of Perseverance

Tribulation is a general term referring to the hardships and sufferings that God’s people will always have to pass through. Tribulation is a rite of passage for the believer.

Matt 24
21 For at that time there will be great tribulation, the kind that hasn’t taken place from the beginning of the world until now and never will again! 22 Unless those days were limited, no one would survive. But those days will be limited because of the elect.

Acts 14
22 …“It is necessary to pass through many troubles (or tribulations) on our way into the kingdom of God.”

2 Thess 1
3 We must always thank God for you, brothers. This is right, since your faith is flourishing and the love each one of you has for one another is increasing. 4 Therefore, we ourselves boast about you among God’s churches—about your endurance and faith in all the persecutions and afflictions you endure. 5 It is a clear evidence of God’s righteous judgment that you will be counted worthy of God’s kingdom, for which you also are suffering, 6 since it is righteous for God to repay with affliction those who afflict you 7 and to reward with rest you who are afflicted, along with us. This will take place at the revelation of the Lord Jesus from heaven with His powerful angels, 8 taking vengeance with flaming fire on those who don’t know God and on those who don’t obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus.

Tribulation is necessary for us to fellowship with Christ in his sufferings and tribulation is necessary for our personal sanctification. And it is expected that true believers will survive whatever tribulations come our way and endure to the end.

Matt 24
13 But the one who endures to the end will be delivered.

Examine your life. What trips you up? What derails your faith? Not sleeping enough. Getting a bad grade. Getting yelled at by your boss. Having indigestion? What trips you up? We need to toughen up because harder times are coming and if little things trip us up now, we won’t make it when difficult tribulation comes.

4) Watchful Readiness

I want to end with a story. When I was a kid, I loved it when my parents went to Bible study. No, it wasn’t because I was concerned about their spiritual lives. It was because my brother and I stayed home alone. My parents expected that we would be studying I guess for the entire evening but when the cat is away, the mice come out to play. We watched TV several hours straight. It was the 80s and back then, we had one of those gargantuan Zenith TV boxes which weigh about 100 pounds and the screen was like 20 inches. Not only was the TV huge, but it got really hot.

So around 11pm to midnight, I’d be watching but I’d have one ear listening for the car door slam. When I heard it, I knew I had roughly 15 seconds to wipe down the TV with a damp cloth to cool it off. I was watchful and ready.

The whole point of my watchfulness was to avoid punishment. And there is a sense in which we are watchful for the Lord’s coming because we don’t want to get into trouble, but it’s more than that. Even being watchful in order to avoid punishment as a motivation is better than nothing. Most people are not watchful at all because hey, nobody can predict when Jesus will return so why bother? We are not watchful. Quite the opposite, we live carelessly.

For the true believer, we are watchful and responsible and faithful in our service in part because we don’t want to get in trouble in the same way that an employee might have relaxed at work for a few days while the boss was away but the day before the boss returns, you better get everything in order.

Avoidance of punishment is not the sole motivator for our watchfulness. We are watchful because we are waiting for him.

Heb 9
27 And just as it is appointed for people to die once—and after this, judgment— 28 so also the Messiah, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time, not to bear sin, but to bring salvation to those who are waiting for Him.

Are you waiting for Jesus? Do you long for his appearing? If so, you will be watchful and ready, no matter when he comes.

Three-Part Series on Vision 2013 – Make Disciples (pt3 of 3)

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3) Final misconception: I can be close to God without being a disciple maker.

This is a big one. Did you ever notice that those who are out there making disciples, those who are on the frontlines, those who sell everything and actually go to missions, those who devote themselves in the service of others, those who are impacting others, have you noticed that these people seem to have a special relationship with God? Not always, but more often than not.

Of course, if you are a monk and that’s your calling to pray and read Scripture all day and connect with God in a special way separate from society, then you might conclude that it’s possible to be close to God without being involved in the lives of others. But, I invite you to take a look at the tail end of the Great Commission. The latter half of v20–

Matt 28
20 …And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.

This promise of God being with us. This promise is reserved only for those whose life mission is to make disciples. If you are not making disciples, then this promise–surely I will be with you always, to the very end of the age–doesn’t apply to you.

If you are a believer, God is with you. He will never leave nor forsake you. But if you are looking for a deeper sense of his presence, you can’t get around these verses. Those who are actively engaged in making disciples will experience, I believe, a deeper, more tangible sense of God’s presence.

You and I want to be close to God. Otherwise, you wouldn’t be here. In a church service listening to a sermon. You and I want to be filled with the Holy Spirit. We want to be a Spirit-filled. But what is the goal of being filled with the Spirit? Is it so that we feel good about ourselves? Do we want to be filled with the Spirit to gain a holy high, a spiritual high, an experience? What is the goal? To answer that, please turn with me to Acts 1:8.

Acts 1
8 But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.

This is right after the Great Commission was declared by Jesus, right after He ascended, but before the church was birthed in Acts 2. The disciples were gathered and they didn’t know what to do. Their leader Jesus was gone and they were scared for their lives. Jesus had left them with these parting words–all authority in heaven and on earth is mine so therefore go out and make disciples with that same authority. But the disciples couldn’t do it. And maybe you find yourself today exactly where the disciples were in Acts 1. You want it. You want to make disciples, but you can’t do it.

If this is you, I invite you to pray for the Holy Spirit. I pray that right now the Holy Spirit would come and touch lives and revive souls. I pray that Holy Spirit would stir hearts. For what purpose? Toward what end? To feel Spirit-filled? Is that the goal? Yes. Partly. We want to be close to God in a deep, devotional sense. That’s part of it. But it doesn’t stop there. Acts 1:8–

Acts 1
8 But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; AND you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.

This is a rephrasing of the Great Commission. If you love God and His love, His Spirit fills you, you will love God in return. That’s a no brainer. But that’s not all. You also will be His witnesses. If you receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you, you will be his witnesses in your home, at your workplace, in Pasadena and the circle widens, you and I will be witnesses in LA, Southern California, the United States, to the ends of the earth, to wherever he sends us.

God’s promise to be with us always comes in the context of us going and making disciples of all nations.

If you flip the verse, and say, I just want to be close to God but I have no intention of being a witness, I have no desire to make disciples, then we have no right to demand God’s presence and the filling of His Spirit. We ask for His presence, we ask to be Spirit-filled in part so that we can be effective witnesses for Jesus to the ends of the earth.

This is why the greatest commandment and the second greatest commandment go together. Loving God and loving neighbor go hand in hand. If the love of God is in you, then there will be love for neighbor. You can love neighbor for all kinds of wrong reasons so loving neighbor by itself is no guarantee that you love God. But, not loving neighbor is a guarantee that you don’t love God. If you love God but hate your brother, then you’re a liar because your lack of love for your brother proves that the love of God is not in you.

The same principle applies here. If you are truly a disciple of Jesus Christ, you will make disciples. No one has to coerce you, no one has to twist your arm. It will just happen naturally.

Your love for Jesus will overflow to others and God willing, you will have a privilege to lead people to Christ. And it doesn’t say, after you make a disciple and you lead a person to Christ, have your pastor baptize them. Baptizing them is part of your responsibility. Wouldn’t it be wonderful, if you got a chance to baptize the person you led to Christ. If you lead someone to Christ, don’t you think it would be meaningful for you and for the new convert whose life you impacted if you were part of the baptism ceremony? In the baptistry over there together. Right? It would be meaningful. I haven’t really talked about this with others. I am just throwing it out there. Think about it.

Part of our responsibility to make disciples includes going, it includes baptizing, and it also includes teaching. Teaching what? Teaching them to obey everything Christ commanded us.

Teaching is hard. You can hear a lecture about linear algebra and it might make sense to you while you are listening during the lecture. But if the professor asks you to come up in front of the class and teach, that’s an entirely different matter. The same goes for us in our relationship with God. Someone can ask you, do you know Jesus? Yeah, kind of. I think I know him. But when someone asks, well, then, can you teach me about this Jesus? If someone asks you to teach them about Jesus, you got to really know your material.

This means it’s your responsibility to learn this book. Because this book teaches how you and I can relate with Jesus. This book is all about Jesus. The Word of God in the flesh. It’s your responsibility to teach someone how to obey everything Christ commanded. That means, you got to know Jesus personally. You are not teaching facts ABOUT Jesus. You are not transferring second hand information that you heard from someone else about Jesus. You can’t simply regurgitate what you read in a book about Jesus. You are not teaching about the mechanics of spiritual life, you are introducing someone to the Author of Life. Truth is a person.

And so when we are teaching others about Jesus, it forces us to search our hearts. And soon enough, if you’ve been teaching others about Christ long enough, you will eventually realize I can’t get by with facts and jargon and second hand knowledge. And you start asking, do I know this Jesus? How can I teach others about Jesus unless I know him personally myself?

When you are teaching someone how to obey all of Christ’s commands, you need to have firsthand knowledge of Christ. Because you are not imparting facts, you are imparting Christ. There is a world of difference between sharing facts about Jesus versus sharing Christ himself. If you obey this Great Commission, God will be with you always, to the very end of the age. Why? Because you will find yourself constantly going back to Jesus to feed your own soul so that you have something authentic to feed others with. You will have testimony. Your own testimony about Jesus. Jesus is the bread of life. Go to him that you may go to others and introduce them to the Jesus you know firsthand.

To wrap up, 3 resolutions for us in 2013: 1) love God, 2) love neighbor, and 3) make disciples. I pray that we can all experience Christ personally as we commit to these 3 things in the coming year.