WAIT NOT WASTE
Acts 1:1-14

Jesus, after His persecution, about the time He ascended to heaven, “And being assembled together with them, He commanded them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the promise of the Father, ‘which’, He said, ‘you have heard from Me; 5 For John truly baptized with water, but you shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now.’” (Acts 1:4-5) The disciples needed to wait for the promise that was to promote and present them as agents of power, but they could not get through with the message. They had been trained and they were about to be stretched by transforming their training and impacting souls. Jesus clearly pointed out to them in Acts 1:8, “But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be witnesses to Me in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.” Having received the power through the Holy Spirit, they were to go beyond Jerusalem; they were not to waste by operating only in Jerusalem. Indeed the power came and they all received the power just as Jesus had promised them. When power came upon them, they were to go beyond Jerusalem, and Judea and Samaria to the end of the earth, but they continued waiting when waiting was supposed to have been over. When we receive direction the way we want it to be and when we fail not to get direction the way it is delivered unto us, it could lead to a devastating or painful experience. Jesus did not mean for them to remain in Jerusalem for as long as they wanted or as long as they could wait. They were supposed to journey to the end of the earth after receiving power. Have you been operating or responding only halfway in His command? Disciples have been operating disability in hearing ever since Jesus was walking with them in the face of earth. Once Jesus responded to their disability in listening, “Why do you not understand My speech? Because you are not able to listen to My word.” (John 8:43) Are you suffering from listening disability? The disciples boxed themselves up in Jerusalem until devastation happened when Stephen suffered persecution by being stoned to death. As a result of Stephen’s persecution, the disciples scattered. Acts 11:19, “Now those who were scattered after the persecution that arose over Stephen traveled as far as Phoenicia, Cyprus, and Antioch, preaching the word to no one but the Jews only.” Did they have to suffer waste within before scattering to different parts of the world? Ask Jesus to deliver you from every listening disability that could cause waste in place of waiting. Until they were scattered abroad, the word Christians did not have a place. Acts 11:26, “…And the disciples were first called Christians in Antioch.”