Empower: Discover Your Spiritual Gifts Sample

Power of the Spirit

Yesterday, we discovered that God gives to us according to His great riches, but what does He give to us? Ephesians 3:16 says He grants us "might"—better-rendered power—"through His Spirit." The Greek word for might is dunamis, the root word for dynamite. It describes miraculous force, abundance, or violent power. And God imparts this power through the person of the Holy Spirit.

In the New Testament, three Greek prepositions are used to describe our relationship to the Holy Spirit: 1) para, meaning with; 2) en, which we know as in; and 3) epi, translated upon.

· The Spirit is with us before salvation to convict us of sin and bring us to repentance, as we read in John 16.

· The Spirit comes in us at salvation, as our passage in John 14 tells us.

· The Spirit comes upon the saint through what is known as the filling of the Spirit, as Acts 1:8 describes.

The first evidence of the filling of the Spirit is power. Power for what? For purpose—empowering us to become witnesses of the gospel. The second evidence and benefit of the filling is presents—His divine gifts, which equip saints to be dynamic ministers. These gifts are often referred to as spiritual gifts, and there's at least one spiritual gift just for you.