You Are Carrying More Than You Know

If you know me, you know Spider-Man holds a special place. Always has.

And if you have seen Spider-Man: Brand New Day, you know the setup is unexpectedly compelling. Peter Parker is forgotten. After Dr. Strange's spell, nobody remembers who he is. He moves through New York as a ghost, protecting a city that has no idea he exists. No recognition. No credit. No audience. Just the responsibility. Just the power being used for people who will never know his name.

And his powers are changing. Evolving in ways he does not fully understand yet. Something is happening inside him that is bigger than what he currently knows how to handle.

The line that started all of this is the one Uncle Ben made famous: with great power comes great responsibility.

It is a good line. But here is what I want to sit with this week. What if the problem for most believers is not a failure to take responsibility seriously. What if the problem is that we have drastically underestimated the power we are actually carrying?

When Jesus poured out the Holy Spirit on the disciples at Pentecost, Peter stood up and quoted the prophet Joel: "And it shall be in the last days, God says, that I will pour forth of My Spirit on all mankind; and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams; even on My bondslaves, both men and women, I will in those days pour forth of My Spirit." (Joel 2:28–29)

What Peter was announcing was not simply a new religious experience. He was declaring that the power of the Messianic Era had broken through into the present. The healings, the prophecies, the gifts of the Spirit were not meant to be understood as isolated supernatural events. They were tokens. Down payments. The Messianic Age pressing forward into this present age through every person in whom the Spirit dwells.

The lessons of Scripture describe it this way: the gifts of the Spirit are tokens of the Messianic Era, a down payment on the promises of the kingdom of heaven, bringing the power of the Messianic Age into our world today. Paul says God sealed us and gave us the Spirit in our hearts as a pledge (2 Corinthians 1:21–22). A pledge is not the full amount. It is the guarantee of the full amount. Which means every believer alive right now is walking around with a deposit of the age to come living inside them.

Think about what Jesus did in Mark 1. He healed Simon's mother-in-law. By evening the whole town had gathered and He healed many. He drove out demons. He cleansed a leper with a touch and two words: I am willing. Be clean. The lessons describe this as Jesus borrowing from the healing power of the future Messianic Era to meet the suffering of the present moment. He was not performing isolated miracles. He was demonstrating what the age to come looks like when it arrives early.

Then He sent His disciples out to do the same: "Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons." (Matthew 10:7–8) He gave them the mission and the power to carry it. They went out as ordinary people carrying extraordinary resources that did not originate in themselves.

That is still the situation of every follower of Jesus today. Ordinary people. Extraordinary deposit. A down payment of the Messianic Era living inside them, pressing forward into a world that is still groaning under the weight of everything that is broken.

Peter Parker protects a city that has forgotten he exists. He does it anyway because the power demands it. The responsibility is not optional when you are carrying something that size.

Jesus told His disciples: "You will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be My witnesses both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and even to the remotest part of the earth." (Acts 1:8) The power was not given for the disciples to hold. It was given for the world around them. The Spirit moves outward. Always outward. Toward the sick, the forgotten, the bound, the people whose names nobody seems to know.

The question is not whether you have the power. If the Spirit of God lives in you, you do. The question is whether you understand what you are carrying well enough to take the responsibility seriously.

Peter Parker's powers are evolving in ways he does not yet understand. He is carrying something that is growing larger than his current framework for it.

That is an honest description of what the Holy Spirit does in a believer who is genuinely following Jesus. The deposit grows. The capacity for what God can do through you expands. Not because you become more impressive, but because you become more available.

The responsibility that comes with great power is not primarily moral in the way the world means it. It is missional in the way Jesus means it. The Spirit was not given so you could manage a private spiritual experience. It was given so that the healing power of the Messianic Era could keep flowing through ordinary people into a world that desperately needs it.

You are not a reservoir. You are a riverbed.

Joel said your sons and daughters would prophesy. Your young men would see visions. Your old men would dream dreams. On bondslaves, both men and women, the Spirit would be poured. No demographic left out. No person too ordinary to carry it.

That means you.

The city you live in has people who are sick and forgotten and bound and unclean. They do not need you to be impressive. They need you to show up with what you are carrying.

With great power comes great responsibility. And you have more of the first than you have yet accepted of the second.