Stubborn People

May 23, 2011

VERSE:
"You stubborn people! You are heathens at heart and deaf to the
truth. Must you forever resist the Holy Spirit? That's what your
ancestors did, and so do you!"
-- Acts 7:51

THOUGHT:
Stephen spoke with wisdom and empowered by the Holy Spirit. Yet
he knew that there was great opposition to the Jesus he proclaimed
and the truth that he spoke. He also knew that this was nothing
new. God's own people had consistently opposed God's servants in
every age even though those servant leaders had been inspired and
empowered by the Holy Spirit. Their stubbornness made their hearts
hard and their ears deaf to the truth of God. Yet it wasn't the
words of Stephen and the prophets that they ultimately resisted:
they resisted and rejected the Holy Spirit of God (1 Thess. 4:8).
Let's be different than they were. Let's humbly ask God to use his
Spirit to convict us where we need to be changed, fortify us where
we need to be strengthen, to instruct us where we are ignorant, and
bring hope to hearts when they are broken.

PRAYER:
O Father, with the words of King David, I pray: "My sacrifice, O
God, is a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart you, God, will
not despise." I ask, dear Father, that you cleanse my heart of any
sin and purify my motives as I seek to serve you and never resist
the influence of your Holy Spirit within me. I pray this in the
name of Jesus, my Lord. Amen.