Stepping Up

Being sent out by the Holy Spirit, they came down to Seleucid, and from there sailed to Cyprus. Arriving in Salamis, they proclaimed God's message in the Jewish synagogues. They also had John as their assistant. When they had gone through the whole island as far as Paphos, they came across a sorcerer, a Jewish false prophet named Bar-Jesus. He was with the proconsul, Sergius Paulus, an intelligent man. This man summoned Barnabas and Saul and desired to hear God's message. But Elymas ( this is the meaning of his name) the sorcerer opposed them and tried to turn the procounsul away from the faith.
Then Saul-also called Paul-filled with the Holy Spirit, stared straight at the sorcerer and said, "You son of the devil, full of all deceit and all fraud, enemy of righteousness! Won't you ever stop perverting the straight paths of the Lord? Now, look! The Lord's hand is against you. You are going to be  blind, and you will not see the sun for a time." Suddenly a mist and darkness fell on him, and he went around seeking someone to lead him by the hand.
Then the proconsul, seeing what had happened, believed and was astonished at the teaching about the Lord. Acts 13:4-12

The first mission, to Cyprus. Here Baranabas and Saul have a helper called John Mark. It is believed this is the Mark who wrote the gospel of Mark. John Mark does not last long. This island is all he can handle at present. He may have been young, he may have struggled with the way Paul dealt with things, who knows? He may have missed his mum. Whatever the reason he turns for home after this trip.

I love the way Paul confronts the sorcerer. I've done something similar, well, I didn't call down blindness on the sorcerer but I confronted he spirit in a woman, I could see she had a seductive spirit and was sent tho cause trouble, and she did, but not where she wanted. She picked off a sidekick not the main man. When I confronted the woman the Spirit of God was upon me, I was on fire. I understand how Paul could have done what he did and said what he did, I would do the same, under the unction of the Holy Spirit. Outside of the Holy Spirit, bad move, destined for failure and mud on the face.

Notice Saul becomes Paul and also Saul steps up in the same move to lead in the Spirit. He is stepping into his destiny. I love it when the a Holy Spirit drives, the show is a show stopper. Tonight I watched such a man, Samuel Rodriguez, preach at the Presence conference in Sydney Australia. He was on fire.

There is one day left of the conference and this man is preaching tomorrow afternoon, first session, not to be missed!

Tonight Darlene Zschech led the worship, sooo good! An excellent night!

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