Acts 1, Verse 1 is the part of the Bible that teaches us what happened after Jesus was resurrected.  He appeared over a period of forty days and during that period, he spoke about the Kingdom of God and told the apostles not to leave Jerusalem but to wait to be baptized with the Holy Spirit.

If you read the book of John, the 14^th Chapter, the 16^th  and 17^th verses, you see that Jesus said ^{16 “}And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another advocate to help you and be with you forever— ¹⁷ the Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept him, because it neither sees him nor knows him. But you know him, for he lives with you and will be in you.”

And then in the 20^th and 26^th verses, he goes on to say ^{20 “}On that day you will realize that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you.”

^{26 “}But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you.”

In Acts, Chapter 1, Verse 8, Jesus is even more explicit – he tells the apostles “you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you.”

In Acts 1, it teaches us that ^12″ the apostles returned to Jerusalem . . .[and]  ¹³ When they arrived, they went upstairs to the room where they were staying. [And] ¹⁴ They all joined together constantly in prayer, along with the women and Mary the mother of Jesus, and with his brothers.”

And in Acts 2, we learn that “when the day of Pentecost came, they were all together in [this] place. ²  Suddenly a sound like the blowing of a violent wind came from heaven and filled the whole house where they were sitting. ³ They saw what seemed to be tongues of fire that separated and came to rest on each of them. ⁴ All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit . . .”

All of them were filled with this power!  As long as we are open and receptive and are anointed with the Holy Spirit, we too have this power.  You see, we don’t want to take responsibility for it – we don’t own up to it; we don’t want to tap and tune into it – we too lazy to even use it – we want to keep asking a God outside of us, an unreachable, vengeful God in the sky to do the work for us — but that still doesn’t change the fact that God has given us power.

Paul reminds us of this in Second Timothy Chapter 1, Verses 6-7,  when Paul says  ^“the Spirit God gave us does not make us timid, but gives us power . .”  In Verse 14, he says, “Guard the good deposit that was entrusted to you—guard it with the help of the Holy Spirit who lives in us.”

SAY I’m GUARDING MY POWER.  BUT HERE’S THE MOST IMPORTANT THING – SAY I’m USING THE POWER THAT I GUARD.

I choose the direction I take.  I’m not going to just cave in;  I’m not going to throw in the towel;  I’m not going to stop fighting – I’m not going to stop pushing forward.  I choose to stay on the path – to be disciplined – to be obedient. Oh there may be distractions, but I am going to fight the good fight with self-discipline, love, and power.

SAY I HAVE THE POWER TO CHOOSE WHAT COURSE I WILL TAKE.  I HAVE THE POWER TO CHANGE MY LIFE.
I HAVE THE POWER TO EXPERIENCE WHAT I WANT TO EXPERIENCE.
If it doesn’t work, I have the power to fix it.
I have the power to heal my body.
I have the power to stay the course.
I have the power to choose love over lust.
I have the power to choose courage over fear.
I have the power to stare my enemy face to face and move right through him – with the realization that my power takes him out.

My power is the unlimited, inexhaustible, infinite, all-knowing source of the universe.  A source that is one with absolute good – a good in me that can dissect, reject, resurrect, interject, counteract, dissolve lack, enrich me, reward me, restore me, recreate me, renovate me –an on-time, every-time, everywhere, anywhere, anyhow, anything, anyway awesome God that has given me power.

I am the creator of my own reality.
It doesn’t matter how serious it looks, how great it feels, how embattled I am, I have the power to change it.

No one is better than me, smarter than me, more effective than me to bring about the change that I need.  No one has the power to deprive me of anything.  Nothing outside of me controls me or forces me to lose or helps me win.  I have the power to change my life.  I have the power to bring about the circumstances that I need. I have the power to release everything that is not in harmony with the life that I want.  I have the power meet the people that will help me create the success that I want.

FOUR important things about power:
ONE:  I CAN ACCESS POWER IN THE SILENCE.

The silence is the most power-filled place to move beyond the physical and the flesh and listen to the Holy Spirit.  In the silence, my intuition is sharper.
The answers that I need come to me.

I am guided to make the best decisions.

I lower the frequency of my vibrations and center myself in God.   TAKE ONE MINUTE RIGHT NOW – AND BE SILENT.  CLOSE YOUR EYES AND JUST LISTEN TO YOUR BREATH.

That’s POWER.  In Psalm 46, the Psalmist said “Be still, and know that I am God.”

TWO:  I HAVE THE POWER TO CHOOSE MY THOUGHTS.  Right now, in this very instance, you can change your life!  You can change your experiences!  You can change your relationships!  You can change the way you think about yourself!  You can change the way you think about others!  You can see yourself differently and become different.

I WANT YOU TO THINK OF SOMETHING RIGHT NOW THAT YOU ARE WORRIED ABOUT:  NOW CHOOSE YOUR THOUGHTS TO SEE A SUCCESSFUL OUTCOME.  YOU DON’T HAVE TO KNOW WHO IS GOING TO HELP YOU OR HOW YOU’RE GOING TO BE HELPED OR WHEN IT’S GOING TO HAPPEN — BUT USE YOUR POWER TO CHOOSE THE BEST OUTCOME, THE GOOD THAT YOU DESIRE.

THREE: I CAN SPEAK TRUTH TO POWER.
Our power allows us to speak what we want into existence.  Don’t you dare say “po’ me”(the Kingdom is yours); don’t you dare say — there go I but for the grace of God (God’s grace is everyone’s); don’t you dare say I’m not worthy (we are heirs to the throne).

Instead: declare what you want in your life!

Wake up and declare it!  Go to bed and declare it!

Sing in the shower and declare it.  Ride in the taxi and declare it.  Post on FB and declare it.  Stand up in your office and declare it!  Look out your window and declare it!  Walk down the street and declare it!

Your power is whatever you say.  Our words put us in alignment with our good.  There is no limit to the good that you will receive.  Our lives are waiting for us to command them.

 Repeat after me: 

“Counsel and sound judgment are mine; I have insight, I have power.”  Proverbs 8:14

“God of my ancestors: You have given me wisdom and power.”  Daniel 2:23

“For the kingdom of God is not a matter of talk but of power.”  1^st Corinthians 4:20

FOUR: I HAVE POWER EVEN WHEN I FEEL WEAK.

In 2 Corinthians 12, Paul takes it even further in verses 7-10, he says:  “in order to keep me from becoming conceited, I was given a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me. ⁸ Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. ⁹ But he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’ Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. ¹⁰ That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.”

When I appear weak, I have the power to be well.
When I appear weak, I have the power to choose success.  When I appear weak, I have the power to choose prosperity over poverty; wisdom over ignorance; courage over fear.  What matters is not what appears to be – but the power that I KNOW is the core of my existence.  Nothing and no one can stand in its way.

And this is how powerful we are:

Envision something that you want to heal – say it is done.  See something that you need to achieve – say it is done.  Now see that huge and seemingly impossible task, and say it is done.

It is done.  It is done.  It is done.  It is done.

There is no limit to the good that we can receive.

We are extraordinary beings and our extraordinary lives come simply from being the power that we are.

And so it is, so let it be.  AMEN.