Good morning. Jesus said to them again, peace be with you;
as the Father has sent Me, I also send you. And when He had said this, He
breathed on them and said to them, receive the Holy Spirit. So, did they
receive the indwelling of the Holy Spirit at that moment, or did it not happen
until the day of Pentecost like some believe? My Bible even says that it was in
anticipation of what would happen 50 days later. I heard a tape one time by
Oral Roberts that he asked some members of the faculty of his university who
taught Greek exactly what did it mean; and they said it meant to receive right
now the Holy Spirit. Also the Greek word translated “breathed on“ used here is
the same word that was used in the Septuagint (The translation into Greek of
the Hebrew Scriptures years before Christ was born) when it says in Genesis
that the Lord God formed man of dust from the ground, and “breathed into“ his
nostrils the breath of life. The word in both instances literally means to
breathe in. In Acts, before He ascended, Jesus told the disciples that they
would receive power after the Holy Spirit came upon – not in – them. That was
what the day of Pentecost was about, receiving power, not the indwelling of the
Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, their sins have been forgiven
them; if you retain the sins of any, they have been retained. That did not mean
that the disciples would “create“ the forgiving or retaining of sins. The Greek
says that it had already been done (in heaven); they were just proclaiming it.
Father thank You that You breathed on us, and we received the indwelling of the
Holy Spirit. Help us to allow Him full control of our lives.
Therefore I exhort you, be imitators of me
Good morning. Paul then gives a list of a lot of things that he has gone through as an apostle. I do not write these things to shame you, but to admonish you as my beloved children. For if you were to have countless tutors in Christ, yet you would not have many fathers, for in Christ Jesus I became your father through the gospel. There could be many people that you listen to either in church or through the Internet or other means; but there was only one person (as a general rule it was a person) that lead you to Christ. Therefore I exhort you, be imitators of me. He was saying that just like a child imitates his or her father, they were to imitate him. He says that again seven chapters later. Since it is easy to forget some things about people we have not seen in a while, Paul says that he sent Timothy to them to remind them of his ways which are in Christ, just as he taught everywhere in every church. Some have become arrogant, as though I were not coming to you. I shall find ou...
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