Printer Friendly VersionToo often, in our modern era, we take the Church for granted,
as if it has always been here. But the Church has not always been here. The
Church began at Pentecost. It was on that day that a rag-tag, cowardly, and
disjointed group of people became the Body of Christ. It was on that day that
they moved from nothing to significance. The death and resurrection of Jesus
ushered in the “Church Age.”
At the end of the Jesus’ ministry the disciples were left
with doubts and fears; they were left wondering what could possibly be next.
It had been quite a ride with Jesus for those three years. He had left them
baffled on so many occasions. If they had learned anything about Jesus, they
had learned that He was unpredictable. The responses He gave people were counterintuitive,
unconventional, and sometimes jolting and jarring. The disciples seemed unable
to predict what Jesus might do next. They never seemed to be able to understand
His parables. It was as though He were speaking to them in riddles. While
the teaching of Jesus was always filled with love and usually comfort, it
could sometimes be disturbing, and frequently was filled with paradox.
Reinhold Neibuhr wrote, “The function of sermons is to
comfort the afflicted and to afflict the comfortable.” How true that
was for Jesus and His teaching of the people. People who came into contact
with Jesus were people for whom life changed! Now our disciples find themselves
in the same position. Their lives had changed but suddenly Jesus was gone.
What were they going to do?
The terrible truth was simply this: without Jesus they were
already the best they could be. Without Jesus they were prone to doubt. Without
Jesus they would continue to hide out in fear with their doors locked. Without
Jesus they were prone to deny even knowing Him. Without Jesus they were already
about the best they could be. And it was grim.
I imagine the disciples standing around looking at each other,
wondering aloud, “Is this as good as it gets?” They had already
witnessed years of “as good as it gets” religion by growing up Jewish.
They had witnessed “as good as it gets” religion by hanging around
with Jesus for three years and listening to Him interact with the established
religious hierarchy . . . afflicting the comfortable, so to speak. They had
a terrible fear in them, that without Jesus they were already the best they
could be.
Following World War II, a young man named Viktor Frankl, who spent three years
in Nazi Prison camps, went on to become one of Europe’s leading psychiatrists.
He makes this rather grim statement, “Clinics are crowded with people
suffering from a new kind of neurosis: a sense of total and ultimate meaninglessness
of life!” This is what Jesus knew about Pentecost, that the believers
were only now awakening to: we need help living in this world! Without divine
intervention, a sense of total and ultimate meaninglessness of life can overwhelm
us.
Here they were, left alone with their doubts and fears, and
they were to be messengers of the Hope of the world! If I didn’t know
the story, I’d be a little bit frightened that Frankl’s statement
might be true for them . . . a sense of total and ultimate meaninglessness
of life! What should they do? Organize? Replace Judas? Choose a leader? Vote
for a new church board? Put new carpet in the Upper Room? It’s a tough
moment.
What do you do while waiting?
Acts 1:4-5: “On one occasion, while [Jesus] was eating
with them, he gave them this command: ‘Do not leave Jerusalem, but wait
for the gift my Father promised, which you have heard me speak about. For
John baptized with water, but in a few days you will be baptized with the
Holy Spirit’” (NIV).
They waited alright, but they were unsettled. I love the Bible
because it doesn’t hide any of our ugliness or stupidity. The Bible makes
no attempt at hiding our humanness.
Jesus chose His disciples. In fact, we learn in Luke 6 that
Jesus spent the entire night in prayer and meditation deciding which of His
followers to choose as His Apostles. While our disciple friends were waiting
in Jerusalem for this “gift” Jesus told them about, they took it
upon themselves to choose someone to replace Judas. It seemed like the right
thing to do. Acts 1:12-17 & 21-26: “Then they returned to Jerusalem
from the hill called the Mount of Olives, a Sabbath day's walk from the city.
When they arrived, they went upstairs to the room where they were staying.
Those present were Peter, John, James and Andrew; Philip and Thomas, Bartholomew
and Matthew; James son of Alphaeus and Simon the Zealot, and Judas son of
James. They all joined together constantly in prayer, along with the women
and Mary the mother of Jesus, and with his brothers. In those days Peter stood
up among the believers (a group numbering about a hundred and twenty) and
said, ‘Brothers, the Scripture had to be fulfilled which the Holy Spirit
spoke long ago through the mouth of David concerning Judas, who served as
guide for those who arrested Jesus—he was one of our number and shared
in this ministry . . . . Therefore it is necessary to choose one of the men
who have been with us the whole time the Lord Jesus went in and out among
us, beginning from John's baptism to the time when Jesus was taken up from
us. For one of these must become a witness with us of his resurrection.’
So they proposed two men: Joseph called Barsabbas (also known as Justus) and
Matthias. Then they prayed, ‘Lord, you know everyone's heart. Show us
which of these two you have chosen to take over this apostolic ministry, which
Judas left to go where he belongs.’ Then they cast lots, and the lot
fell to Matthias; so he was added to the eleven apostles.”
This is a great insight into the disciples being about as good
as they could be; they basically tossed some dice to decide who should be
an apostle. This was clearly not the way Jesus did things. The man they chose
is never heard from again in the Bible, making this selection a dubious choice
at best. No, they were not experiencing the power of the Holy Spirit in their
decisions or in their work, at least not yet. Jesus had not told them to choose
a successor. This was humans acting human, and without the guidance of the
Holy Spirit, this was about as good as it was going to get. “Unless the
LORD builds the house, its builders labor in vain” (Psalm 127:1, NIV).
Jesus had already told them they needed Him to build His Church (Matthew 16:18,
John 15:5). Without Jesus being with them, without Jesus building His Church,
this was as good as it gets. Therefore, Jesus breathes the Holy Spirit upon
His Church, because good enough isn’t the Church!
A Rushing, Mighty Wind On the Day of Pentecost, Jews from every
nation were gathered in Jerusalem. It was a feast day, a celebration event;
something they had been doing for years. As they gathered together many barriers
came between them all. They had cultural differences, language differences,
ethnic differences, and more. In fact, Luke tells us that there were people
there from: every nation under heaven . . . Parthians, Medes, and Elamites;
residents of Mesopotamia, Judea, and Cappadocia, Pontus, and Asia, Phrygia,
and Pamphylia, Egypt, and the parts of Libya near Cyrene; visitors from Rome
(both Jews and converts to Judaism); Cretans and Arabs.
Josephus, the historian, tells us that though Jerusalem had
a normal population of about 150,000, during these festivals the population
would swell to over a million people. These were pilgrims, who for centuries
had been dispersed to every other nation under heaven, but wanted to be in
the Holy City for these High Holy Days.
Parthians, Medes, Elamites, and residents of Mesopotamia were all from the
East. Judea, Cappadocia, Pontus, Asia, Phrygia, and Pamphylia were all the
Roman Provinces of Asia Minor to their North. Egypt, Libya, and Cyrene were
all from Northern Africa to the South. Rome and Crete were to the West. Even
Arabia is included. Basically, we’ve got representatives from the four
corners of the globe here.
Suddenly, everything changed! Suddenly the sound of a rushing,
mighty wind came upon this diverse and fragmented people. Acts 2:1-3: “When
the day of Pentecost came, they were all together in one place. Suddenly a
sound like the blowing of a violent wind came from heaven and filled the whole
house where they were sitting” (NIV).
When the sound of this mighty wind from heaven came upon them,
it caused these God-fearing Jews from every nation to come together in one
place! That place was the steps of the temple, or Solomon’s Porch, as
they called it. They were all there for a celebration, many out of habit.
But when this sound began to rush in upon them, it got their attention; their
ears perked up! They gathered together at the Temple to see what God might
do.
This wasn’t really an unusual expectation; they longed
for the Lord to do something. They were hopeful that He would someday again
fill the temple with His presence (Malachi 3:1). The Lord was coming to His
temple but it wasn’t the same temple they were thinking of. God was building
a new one. He was no longer going to make the temple of Israel His dwelling
place. He was going to be building a new temple; not from wood, hay, and stubble,
but a temple made of living stones. I Peter 2:4-5: “As you come to him,
the Living Stone—rejected by men but chosen by God and precious to him—you
also, like living stones, are being built into a spiritual house to be a holy
priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus
Christ.”
The focus of where God dwells changes in an instant, from a group of buildings
in Jerusalem to a band of people who would spread out over the face of the
earth. On the Day of Pentecost the Lord came into His temple, the Church,
to make it His dwelling place! We, the followers of Jesus, are the living
stones upon which He builds, and you know that one stone does not a temple
make. We need each other!
Throughout the Bible, the Spirit of God is identified with the
same words that mean breath or wind. A careful reading of Luke’s words
make clear that he isn’t saying that a strong wind blew, but rather the
sound of a strong, blowing wind occurred and that sound caused them to come
together. He’s trying his best to describe for us what it was like to
be there on that day.
The Spirit of the Lord comes upon us suddenly. You can’t
see Him coming; you can only tell that He’s been there. Just as you cannot
see the wind coming but you can tell when the wind is upon you (John 3:5-8).
Wind is a powerful force. Humankind has gained much by harnessing the wind.
By harnessing the wind we can sail the oceans. By harnessing the wind we can
produce electrical power. By harnessing the wind we can fly. Likewise, only
when our lives become a harness or a sail for the Spirit of God, can we accomplish
what He means for us to accomplish in this life.
The Hebrew word for breath and spirit is ruach. The Greek word
for breath and spirit is pneuma.
When God spoke to Ezekiel in the Valley of the Dry Bones, what
was missing from the lives of the people was the Breath of God! What is sorely
lacking in the lives of many today who might want to call themselves “Christian”
is the presence of the wind of the Spirit of God in their lives. It’s
also missing from too many churches!
And without this breath of God, most of us will experience only
the “as good as it gets” version, which falls far below what the
Apostle Paul prays for the Church: “I pray that out of his glorious riches
he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so
that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being
rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the saints,
to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to
know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the
measure of all the fullness of God. Now to him who is able to do immeasurably
more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within
us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations,
for ever and ever! Amen” (Ephesians 3:16-21, NIV).
The sound of a rushing, mighty wind, the appearance of fire,
and the communication of the Gospel in such a way that everyone, regardless
of their race, creed, or ethnic origin could understand, was the sign that
God was doing a new thing! He was ushering in the era of His Church. He was
ushering in an era no longer marked by as good as it gets living, but living
by the Spirit of God!
If you were to ask the question, “What is God doing today?”
there is only one answer: He’s building His Church, filling us with His
power, His presence, and making us one! Nothing has changed in all these years;
this is still the work He is doing today: filling our lives with His presence;
purifying our lives by the power of His Holy Spirit within us; making us one
in unity and in spirit.
“We’ve got Spirit, yes we do! We’ve got Spirit; how ’bout you?”
