The Bible in a Year (with Fr. Mike Schmitz) - Day 340: The Power of the Holy Spirit (2023)

Episode Date: December 6, 2023

Fr. Mike emphasizes the power of the Holy Spirit exemplified in Paul's interaction with those in Ephesus in Acts 19 and reminds us that God wants to fill each of us with the same Holy Spirit so we can walk in his strength. Fr. Mike also highlights the power of sacramentals, the reality of demons acknowledging Jesus, and the importance of removing things in our lives that are harmful. Lastly, as we begin reading the Second Letter of Paul to the Corinthians, we get a glimpse of Paul's heart for the people of Corinth. Today's readings are Acts 19, 2 Corinthians 1-2, and Proverbs 28:22-24. For the complete reading plan, visit ascensionpress.com/bibleinayear. Please note: The Bible contains adult themes that may not be suitable for children - parental discretion is advised.

Hi, my name is Father Mike Schmitz, and you're listening to the Bible in a Year podcast, where we encounter God's voice and live life through the lens of Scripture. The Bible in a Year podcast is brought to you by Ascension. Using the Great Adventure Bible Timeline, we'll read all the way from Genesis to Revelation, discovering how the story of salvation unfolds and how we fit into that story today. It is day 340. You know what that means, that is, there's 25 days left. What the heck?

Are you kidding me? That's bananas. We're reading Acts of the Apostles, chapter 19, Paul in Ephesus. We're also reading the second letter of St. Paul to the Corinthians, chapters one and two, just the beginning of that letter, as well as Proverbs chapter 28, verses 22 through 24. As always, the Bible translation I'm reading from is the Revised Standard Version, second Catholic edition. I'm using the Great Adventure Bible from Ascension. To download your own Bible in your reading plan, you can visit ascensionpress.com slash Bible in a Year. You can also subscribe to

this podcast by clicking on subscribe. We're receiving daily episodes and daily updates. You know what I'm going to say. It is day 340. We're reading Acts chapter 19, 2 Corinthians chapters 1 and 2, the introduction, as well as Proverbs chapter 28, verses 22 through 24. The Acts of the Apostles, chapter 19. Paul in Ephesus. While Apollos was at Corinth, Paul passed through the upper country

and came to Ephesus. There he found some disciples and he said to them, did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed? And they said, no, we have never even heard that there is a Holy Spirit. And he said, into what then were you baptized? They said, into John's baptism. And Paul said, John baptized with the baptism of repentance, telling the people to believe in the one who was to come after him, that is Jesus. On hearing this, they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. And when Paul had laid his hands upon them, the Holy Spirit came on them, and they spoke with tongues and prophesied.

There were about 12 of them in all. And he entered the synagogue and for three months spoke boldly, arguing and pleading about the kingdom of God. about twelve of them in all. And he entered the synagogue, and for three months spoke boldly, arguing and pleading about the kingdom of God. But when some were stubborn and disbelieved, speaking evil of the way before the congregation, he withdrew from them, taking the disciples with him, and argued daily in the hall of Tyrannus. This continued for two years, so that all the residents of Asia heard the word of the Lord, both Jews and Greeks, the sons of Sceva. And God did extraordinary miracles by the hands of Paul, so that handkerchiefs or aprons were carried away from his body to the

sick, and diseases left them, and the evil spirits came out of them. Then some of the itinerant Jewish exorcists undertook to pronounce the name of the Lord Jesus over those who had evil spirits, saying, I adjure you, by the Jesus whom Paul preaches. Seven sons of a Jewish high priest named Sceva were doing this, but the evil spirit answered them, Jesus I know, and Paul I know, but who are you? And the man in whom the evil spirit was leaped on them, mastered all of them, and overpowered them, so that they fled out of that house naked and wounded. And this became known to all residents of Ephesus, both Jews and Greeks, and fear fell upon them all. And the name of the Lord Jesus was extolled.

Many also of those who are now believers came, confessing and divulging their practices. And a number of those who practice magic arts brought their books together and burned them in the sight of all. And they counted the value of them and found it came to 50,000 pieces of silver. So the word of the Lord grew and prevailed mightily.

The Riot at Ephesus Now after these events, Paul resolved in the spirit to pass through Macedonia and Achaia and go to Jerusalem, saying, After I have been there, I must also see Rome. And having sent into Macedonia two of his helpers, Timothy and Erastus, he himself stayed in Asia for a while. About that time there arose no little stir concerning the way, for a man named Demetrius, a silversmith, who made silver shrines of Artemis, brought no little business to the craftsmen. These he gathered together with the workmen of like occupation and said, Men, you know that from this business we have our wealth.

And you see and hear that not only at Ephesus, but almost throughout all Asia, this Paul has persuaded and turned away a considerable company of people, saying that gods made with hands are not gods. And there is danger, not only that this trade of ours may come into disrepute, but also that the temple of the great goddess Artemis may count for nothing, and that she may even be deposed from her magnificence, she whom all Asia and the world worship. When they heard this, they were enraged and cried out, Great is Artemis of the Ephesians. So the city was filled with the confusion,

and they rushed together into the theater, dragging with them Gaius and Aristarchus, Macedonians who were Paul's companions in travel. Paul wished to go in among the crowd, but the disciples would not let him. Some of the Asiarchs also, who were Paul's companions in travel. Paul wished to go in among the crowd, but the disciples would not let him. Some of the Asiarchs also, who were friends of his, sent to him and begged him not to venture into the theater. Now some cried one thing, some another, for the assembly was in confusion, and most of them did not know why they had come together. Some of the crowd prompted Alexander, whom the Jews had put forward, and Alexander motioned with

his hand, wishing to make a defense to the people. But when they recognized that he was a Jew, for about two hours they all with one voice cried out, Great is Artemis of the Ephesians! And when the town clerk had quieted the crowd, he said, Men of Ephesus, what man is there who does not know that the city of the Ephesians is temple-keeper of the great Artemis, and of the sacred stone that fell from the sky? Seeing then that these things cannot be contradicted, you ought to be quiet and do nothing rash. For you have brought these men here who are neither sacrilegious nor blasphemers of our goddess. If therefore Demetrius and the craftsmen with him have a complaint against

anyone, the courts are open and there are pro-councils. Let them bring charges against one another. But if you seek anything further, it shall be settled in the regular assembly. For we are in danger of being charged with rioting today, there being no cause that we can give to justify this commotion. And when he had said this, he dismissed the assembly. The second letter of Paul to the Corinthians. Chapter 1. Salutation. Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and Timothy our brother,

to the church of God which is at Corinth, with all the saints who are in the whole of Achaia, grace to you, and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Paul's Thanksgiving after Affliction Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. For as we share abundantly in Christ's sufferings, so through Christ we share abundantly in comfort too. If we are afflicted,

it is for your comfort and salvation. And if we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which you experience when you patiently endure the same sufferings that we suffer. Our hope for you is unshaken, for we know that as you share in our sufferings, you will also share in our comfort. For we do not want you to be ignorant, brethren, of the affliction we experienced in Asia. For we were so utterly, unbearably crushed that we despaired of life itself. Why, we felt that we had received the sentence of death,

but that was to make us rely not on ourselves, but on God who raises the dead. He delivered us from so deadly a peril and he will deliver us. On him we have set our hope that he will deliver us again. him we have set our hope, that he will deliver us again. You also must help us by prayer, so that many will give thanks on our behalf for the blessing granted us in answer to many prayers. For our boast is this, the testimony

of our conscience that we have behaved in the world and still more toward you, with holiness and godly sincerity, not by earthly wisdom, but by the grace of God. For we write you nothing but what you can read and understand. I hope you will understand fully, as you have understood in part, that you can be proud of us as we can be of you on the day of the Lord Jesus. The postponement of Paul's visit. Because I was sure of this, I wanted to come to you first so that you might have a double pleasure. I wanted to visit you on my way to Macedonia and to come back to you from Macedonia and have you send me on my way to Judea. Was I vacillating when I wanted to do this? Do I make my plans like a worldly man, ready to say yes and no at once? As surely as God is faithful, our word to

you has not been yes and no. For the Son of God, Jesus Christ, whom we preached among you, Silvanus and Timothy and I, was not yes and no, but in him it is always yes. For all the promises of God find their yes in him. That is why we utter the amen through him to the glory of God. But it is God who establishes us with you in Christ and has commissioned us. He has put his seal upon us and given us his spirit in our hearts as a guarantee. But I call God to witness against me. It was to spare you that I refrained from coming to Corinth. Not that we lorded over your faith. We work with you for your joy, for you to stand firm in your faith.

Chapter 2. For I made up my mind not to make you another painful visit. Chapter 2 For I wrote you out of much affliction and anguish of heart and with many tears, not to cause you pain, but to let you know the abundant love that I have for you. Forgiveness for the Offender But if anyone has caused pain, he has caused it not to me, but in some measure, not to put it too severely, to you all. For such a one this punishment by the majority is enough. So you should rather turn to forgive and comfort him, or he may be overwhelmed by excessive sorrow. So I beg you to reaffirm your

love for him. For this is why I wrote that I might test you and know whether you are obedient in everything. Anyone whom you forgive, I also forgive. What I have forgiven, if I have forgiven anything, has been for your sake in the presence of Christ, to keep Satan from gaining the advantage over us, for we are not ignorant of his designs. Paul's anxiety in Troas. When I came to Troas to preach the gospel of Christ, a door was opened for me in the Lord,

but my mind could not rest because I did not find my brother Titus there. So I took leave of them and went on to Macedonia. But thanks be to God, who in Christ always leads us in triumph and through us spreads the fragrance of the knowledge of him everywhere. For we are the aroma of Christ to God

among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing. To one a fragrance from death to death, to the other a fragrance from life to life. Who is sufficient for these things? For we are not, like so many, peddlers of God's word, but as men of sincerity, as commissioned by God, in the sight of God, we speak in Christ. The Book of Proverbs chapter 28 verses 22 through 24.

A miserly man hastens after wealth, and does not know that want will come upon him. He who rebukes a man will afterward find more favor than he who flatters with his tongue. He who robs his father or his mother and says, that is no transgression, is the companion of a man who destroys. Father in heaven, we give you praise and glory. Thank you so much for this day. Thank you so much for the gift of your son and the gift of your Holy Spirit.

Oh my gosh, Lord God, thank you for the gift of your Holy Spirit. It gives us the power to cry out, Abba, Father, that transforms us into your sons and daughters. Help us to always walk in your spirit. Help us to always walk in your will. Help us to always walk in your spirit. Help us to always walk in your will. Help us to always walk in your grace.

In the name of Jesus Christ, our Lord, amen. In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, amen. The Holy Spirit, holy smokes. Acts of the Apostles, chapter 19. Paul goes to Ephesus, right? And here are these people who believe that they're disciples and they are disciples of Jesus.

Paul asks them, did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed? And they said, no, we have never even heard that there is a Holy Spirit. That is a great description of so many Christians, how so many of us live. We know, yeah, we pray in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, of course. But do we live in the power of the Holy Spirit? We so often live like the Ephesians did before Paul showed up, where he spoke over them and prayed over them and they received the power of the Holy Spirit? We so often live like the Ephesians did before Paul showed up, where he spoke over them and prayed over them and they received the power of the Holy Spirit.

Remember at the very beginning of the Acts of the Apostles, what did Jesus Christ promise? He promised to send them the dynamite power of the Holy Spirit. And yet so many of us Christians, we live without that dynamite power. So many of us, we've heard that there was a Holy Spirit, but we never realized, we never realized that God wants, what he wants to do is he wants to fill us with the power of his Holy Spirit and help us walk not only by our own strength, never by our own strength,

but by his strength coming to us through the Holy Spirit. And I think it's just incredible. Now, later on in chapter 19, verse 11, that says God did extraordinary miracles by the hands of Paul. And then it goes on to say, so that handkerchiefs or aprons were carried away from his body to the sick and diseases left them and evil spirits came out of them. This is one of the reasons why we as Catholics, we have religious objects.

We have religious objects that we treat with veneration. It's not because we believe in any kind of superstition as much as it is. it's not because we believe in any kind of superstition as much as it is here is our objects you know handkerchiefs aprons that touched paul's body that then god communicates through stuff god communicates his healing act his healing power so we realize that here this happens in scripture that's why we have that in the catholic church where yeah there are sacred objects and those sacred objects like here in the Acts of the Apostles, communicate God's love. Now, again, it's God himself.

It's not any kind of superstition. It's not any kind of sense of, we trust in the power of the handkerchief. That's not it at all. It is the fact that God uses stuff to reach us, right? We're made of stuff and spirit. So the God works through stuff by the power of his Holy Spirit to reach our stuff and reach our spirit. So the God works through stuff by the power of his Holy Spirit to reach

our stuff and reach our spirit. Hopefully that made sense. Also, I love the story of the sons of Sceva who are trying to exorcise this person, exorcise this demon, I mean. And they say, I adjure you by the Jesus whom Paul preaches. And the evil spirit says, Jesus, I know. And Paul, I know. But who are you? And then he beats them up, mastered all of them, overpowered them so that they fled out of the house naked and wounded. And everyone knew about this. There's something really, really powerful about that reality that the demons know the Christian, right? They know Paul. The demons even more powerfully know Jesus, the only beloved son of God. And they respond, right? They respond

to the holy name of Jesus by being obedient to his powerful name. But to play with that, to play with the name of Jesus is dangerous, right? To play with that idea that we can cast out without knowing Christ, that we could cast out any demons would be foolhardy to say the least. Now we have people in Ephesus who practice magic. And what did they do? They brought their books together and burned them on the side of all. And they counted the value of them

and found it came to 50,000 pieces of silver. Think about this. How many times do we in our lives have something in our lives that don't belong there? They don't belong in the hands of a Christian, whether that be certain movies, certain music, so whatever the thing is. And it has a certain value to it.

And here are these Christians in Ephesus. And what do they do? They have something in their presence, in their possession that should not be in their possession. They didn't go on eBay and say, I've got these magic books, but I'm not into magic anymore because I belong to Jesus. I'm a Christian. So I'm just going to sell these magic books.

Like, no, because you're not going to pass on evil to someone else just because you don't want evil in your life. It's not like you're going to make money off of selling these evil things to someone else. So what do they do? They simply destroyed them. 50,000 pieces of silver. This is a huge act of, of trust in the Lord is huge sacrifice and trust in the Lord of saying, I'm going to divest myself of things that have value for the sake of Jesus Christ, who has ultimate value. And I think that's just, it's incredible. Now it goes on. Here's the artisans, right?

Demetrius, Silversmith, who made silver shrines of Artemis. And they're all losing their business. Because why? Because people aren't worshiping Artemis anymore. They're worshiping Jesus Christ. This is a model. This is a model for what we should be as Christians. As Christians, we should be as Christians. As Christians,

we should be so fully handed over to the Lord that the culture around us has to change. Now, people involved in magic arts, if they wanted to, they could have just kept those magic arts. They could have just kept their shrines of Artemis. They could have just done whatever they wanted to do. And you know what would happen? Nothing. Nothing would be changed. And yet here we have these Christians, these new Christians who are so fully sold out for Jesus that they actually destroy the, I don't want to say the livelihood of these people who are selling idols, but they destroy the livelihood of those people who are selling idols.

And again, feel sorry for those people, but what a gift, what incredible witness. They didn't put them out of business by making a new law. They didn't put them out of business by having a riot or having a protest. They simply said, we are not participating in this destructive and this ultimately diabolical practice that other people do in this city. You can count us out of it. Because why? Because we're Christians.

And again, I just think about how incredible it is when Christians stand together and they simply say, oh, we're not participating in whatever this evil thing is. The world around them has to change. No, it changes through sacrifice, 50,000 pieces of silver worth, but it changes nonetheless. So that's Acts of the Apostles chapter 19. We also have the second letter of St. Paul to the Corinthians. And in this, we get Paul's heart. My gosh. Paul's heart who says, basically, you know that last letter I wrote to you? I wrote it so that I didn't have to say these things to your face.

I mean, he kind of sort of says that. That's one of the interpretations of this. Paul is saying, all those corrections that I offered you, I said that so that when I was with you, I didn't have to correct you. I said that so that when I was with you, you would have already changed and I just would get to love you and not have to correct you. I'm paraphrasing, obviously. But what we see here is a snapshot of Paul's heart. He just loves these people in Corinth. And we know why. I mean, he lived there for a year and a half and he just gave his heart to them. He goes on to say in chapter two, verse one, for I made up my mind not to make you another painful visit.

Because the first one was pretty painful. For if I cause you pain, who is there to make me glad? But the one whom I have pained. And I wrote as I did so that when I came, I might not suffer pain from those who should make me rejoice. For I felt sure of all of you that my joy would be the joy of you all. For I wrote to you out of much affliction

and anguish of heart and with many tears, not to cause you pain, but to let you know the abundant love that I have for you. And that's exactly, that's why he wrote them that first letter. And that's the call of everyone who loves really, every parent, every pastor, every Christian is, I might have to say these words that are hard to hear, but I'm not saying that because I want to beat anyone up. I'm not saying this because I want to be the policeman, God's policeman. I'm saying this because I love you. And that's what I think this podcast has been able to do. I think all the words of your pastors, all the words of your priests over the years, your deacons, your bishops, maybe your parents even, have been able to be spoken to you. And

I think so many of us have heard God's words through this podcast. And we've realized these are God's words of love for me. This is what my pastor has been trying to tell me. This is what my priest has been trying to tell me for all these years. This is what my parents were trying to tell me when I was a kid. And I finally was able to hear it

because I heard God himself. I heard God's word itself spoken to me. And now I kind of sort of am beginning to get it that he loves me. And that's why he told me this, that he loves me and cares about me. And that's why he says these words. Hopefully that makes sense. Maybe it doesn't. Maybe you're like, nope, I'm just, I'm fine. I don't need this. Hopefully this is what's been happening to your life. I know it's what's been happening in my life. And I'm so grateful for these last 340 days because it has been an incredible gift. You have been an incredible gift, not only to me, but to each other. Because I know you're praying for each other.

I know you're praying for each other. I am praying for you. Please pray for me. My name is Father Mike. I cannot wait to see you tomorrow. God bless.