The Most Powerful Message….And The Worst Message

In Downey UBF, I used to serve the Wednesday worship service message every week. The most powerful message I remember delivering was based on Acts 7, Stephen’s martyrdom. Usually I would finish the message on Monday, and then spend Tuesday and Wednesday practicing and praying to digest the passage properly. I served this particular message at the Wednesday worship service with a fearful and trembling heart, and God used it powerfully. In this passage, Stephen was challenging and rebuking the Jewish people, telling them, “You stiff-necked people with uncircumcised hearts and ears! You are just like your fathers: you always resist the Holy Spirit.”

While I was serving the message, the Holy Spirit overtook me and the message was really powerful. I concluded and prayed, then sat down. No one said a word – usually the whole audience would say “Amen” together, but no one responded! I felt a little awkward. Then the presider came up and said, “Let’s sing hymn number __ together,” and the pianist played, but no one sang. The presider then said, “Now let’s have prayer topics and announcements by Missionary Isaac.” Missionary Isaac came to the podium and began to speak, coming up with some jokes, but no one responded – they just stared at him, frozen in their seats. As he struggled, finally people began to respond one by one, and eventually that moment was over. We prayed and finished the meeting. After this, all the disciples were really excited – they had seen the power of God’s word, the Holy Spirit working in the church. “Now what?” they asked eagerly, anticipating the amazing things that would come next. I too was amazed, wondering what would happen in the following week.

The next passage in the book of Acts was chapter 8, the persecution in Judea and Philip evangelizing in Samaria, along with Philip’s encounter with the Ethiopian eunuch. As I struggled in message writing, God helped me greatly, and two divine messages were given to me – one about Philip’s evangelism in Samaria, and the other about the Ethiopian eunuch’s turning to God based on Isaiah. “In his humiliation, he was deprived of justice. Who can speak of his descendants? For his life was taken from the earth.” This passage was about Jesus’ death on the cross, but it seemed that the Ethiopian eunuch was very intrigued by this verse because he himself had no hope of ever having descendants. So he was asking Philip who this person was. Based on that, Philip preached the message of Jesus’ death on the cross, and there the eunuch was very touched and received baptism. Those two parts were really great and very touching, but the message was overall very long – it was about ten pages, maybe 5000 words.

That Wednesday morning, I went to the church and stayed there, practicing and praying all day long. 7:30 pm was our message time, so I stopped practicing around 6 pm and focused on praying, asking the Holy Spirit for His seal of approval upon this message, His confirmation that He would be with me in serving this message. I was looking for that confirmation in my prayer struggle.

While I was praying, I suddenly remembered God’s grace upon my life and began thanking Him and praising Him with all my heart for the amazing things He had done for me. It was such a wonderful time that I shed tears, so happy and satisfied. I assumed this meant that God was confirming His approval, so I said to God, “Thank you for giving me your seal of approval on this message.” But when I said that, it seemed that God rejected those words. I sensed that and was a little confused. But anyway I moved on, and as I was expressing my thanks to God with all my heart, I was so happy and satisfied. It was a really beautiful thing to enjoy time with God in prayer. God’s presence was so real to me, and because this fellowship with Him was so great, I boldly asked God, “Lord, I want you to give me your confirmation that you will bless the rest of my messages on the book of Acts after this.” Up till then, I had been individually struggling with each passage and praying for God’s confirmation each time, so I hoped to get it all at once for future messages. Amazingly, God gave me His confirmation – He said, “I will do it.” I was so happy and thankful. Wow! Praise God!

From the depths of my heart, I praised and thanked God, saying, “Lord, thank you so much for giving me your confirmation for all the messages from this week on!” I was overflowing with happiness. Then when I said that, suddenly, God replied, “When did I say ‘from this message on‘?” When I heard that, I was really embarrassed. I thought I had misheard. So I just prayed a little more and then concluded. Then my time to serve the message came.

The written message was really great, but when I served that message, it was terrible. I was there all alone. I felt like I was just all by myself in the middle of the ocean. What was worse was that the message was so long, killing me slowly. I was saying the words, and simply God was not with me. It was the worst message ever. I felt really miserable, and it was very lonely – all by myself in front of all those people.  In hindsight, I know now why it did not go well – it was because I was just lecturing the audience, as if I knew something that they did not know, instead of struggling to serve the word of God. That Sunday, 4 days later in the missionary testimony meeting after worship service, one missionary openly shared his testimony, blaming me. He had brought one sheep from USC, expecting that the Wednesday worship service would be good, but it was the worst message! And as he blamed me during the testimony meeting, I could not say anything – I just hung my head low because indeed, it was the worst message ever. He was right.

After that Wednesday worship service, I went to God in prayer, feeling like a flat tire in spirit. I had no strength left and I asked God, “Lord, why didn’t you go with me? It was so hard. It was really difficult.” I was crying and expressing my sense of failure. God remained silent. At that time, as I was praying, what comforted me was that He had given me His confirmation on all the messages on the book of Acts from the following week on. There were 15 more weeks to go in the book of Acts, and I knew a lot of things could happen, many unexpected challenges. So I wondered how God would help me.

But in the following weeks, indeed God was there in each of my messages – in both preparation and delivery. Each message was divine. There was one challenge – one week I was knocked out and could not write anything, even though Wednesday was approaching fast. I wondered how God would help me write this message. He had promised He would, but how would this work when I was knocked out and could not write a single word? Time was ticking…then during Bible study on Sunday when I shared my difficulty, one disciple volunteered. Usually no one volunteers for this because message writing is burdensome. But he volunteered! The next day, he sent his message to me. Curious, I checked it out. Then as I read the first page, suddenly God’s inspiration came to me, and right there, I opened another window and began typing, quickly finishing the entire message in 2 or 3 hours. It was really great! I talked to that disciple and explained what had happened. “Since God gave me His message, I think I must serve this week,” and he said, “Okay, no problem!” It was very miraculous and mysterious to me. In this way, God helped me with all the messages on the book of Acts, just as He had promised.

It was very interesting… the most powerful message one week, and the worst message the next. What I learned is that I must never try to lecture anyone, but struggle to serve the word of God, so that what that passage talks about may become clear.