Those of you who know me well know that I have a love affair with words.
I suppose that's what you would expect of an English teacher.
That was one of the things that I used to really truly love teaching.
So have you noticed that there's some new words circulating in the English language?
Have you heard of some new words?
Sometimes words change meanings.
I just want to do a couple of new words with you.
How many of you have heard the word adulting?
Adulting. Have you heard that word?
If you're adulting, you pay your own bills, you buy your own gas, you buy your own insurance, you become a responsible person.
Sometimes it gets used as kind of a slam.
Well, you're late.
People who are adulting are on time.
You heard that one? I've heard that one.
Words are important.
Then there's another relatively new word called backstory.
Have you heard, anybody heard the term backstory?
Yeah, relatively new.
You know, last maybe a couple years.
The backstory.
And so there's always a backstory.
A riot, a school shooting or a church shooting, a failed marriage, an amazing success.
There's always something behind.
Why did that happen?
What happened to make that happen?
That's what a backstory is.
Well, it's always something that happens before an event.
One example might be Ben Carson's success as a surgeon.
He became a success as a surgeon because he had a mother who wanted to make sure that her kids were well educated.
And they grew up in the ghetto, disadvantaged background, but he was a success because he had a mother that was making sure that her kids did the right thing for the right reasons and did their schoolwork.
Well, today we're going to talk about Pentecost.
But before we get to Pentecost, we need to look at the backstory.
Okay?
So we're going to start with the promise.
When Jesus was with his disciples, he gave them the promise of the Spirit.
He was nearing the close of his ministry.
He was standing in the shadow of the cross.
Well, the full realization that that load of guilt was just about to land on him as the sin bearer.
Before offering himself as a sacrificial victim, he instructed his disciples regarding the most essential and complete gift that he could bestow on his followers.
The gift that would bring within their reach the boundless resources of his grace.
And our scripture reading for this morning, I'm going to repeat.
He said, and this is in his last time spent with his disciples, he said, I will pray the Father and he will give you another helper that he may abide with you forever.
The Spirit of truth whom the world cannot receive because it neither sees him nor knows him.
But you will know him for he dwells with you and will be in you.
That was the promise.
And if you look through John 14, 15, 16, that promise in some form or another is repeated seven times.
The Spirit was coming.
The helper was coming.
It's one of the one of the lists of seven in the book of John.
He promised. So part of the back story is there was a promise.
The Savior was pointing forward to a time when the Holy Spirit should come and do a mighty work as his representative.
The evil that had been accumulating for centuries was to be resisted by the divine power of the Holy Spirit.
So event number one, the promise.
Event number two, the crucifixion.
The disciples were horrified.
They were scared.
They were intimidated.
They were depressed.
But we were hoping that it was going to be he who was going to redeem Israel.
They were mourning and weeping.
They were bitterly disappointed because they were looking to sitting as representatives in high government in this new kingdom.
They felt utterly hopeless.
They were despondent.
They were grief filled.
They were sorrow filled.
They met in the upper room behind closed locked doors in fear that their master's fate would be their own.
Event number three, the resurrection.
The women went to the tomb.
They were going to embalm him with sweet smelling spices.
And they were met by two angels who said, he's not here.
He isn't.
Go tell his disciples.
And they ran to tell the disciples and the disciples said, yeah, what do you know?
You're kidding.
Of course not.
But Peter and John, they went to check out the empty tomb and sure enough they found that the tomb was empty.
Mary came back and she was weeping.
But her great sorrow was turned to a great joy because Jesus said, Mary, I'm here.
And she was amazed and she reached out to touch him and he said, don't touch me yet.
I haven't gone to my father.
Wait till I come back.
Okay.
Then he appeared to the eleven as they sat at the table and he rebuked their unbelief and hardness of heart.
He said, they didn't believe the others who had seen him.
And Thomas particularly was in for it.
Okay.
Because Thomas here, touch me.
I'm real.
Then he met with two of his followers on the road to Emmaus.
For 40 days, Jesus remained here on earth.
And he met with them in various places.
He was preparing them for the work that was before him, before them.
And they hadn't been able to comprehend it before because they had preconceived ideas about what this new kingdom was going to be like.
So he spoke of the prophecies.
He studied scripture with them.
He showed them how everything had been fulfilled.
And he opened their understanding that they might understand scripture and said to them, this, it was written this way.
It behooved Christ to suffer and to rise from the dead the third day.
That the repentance and remission of sins should be preached in his name among all the nations.
Beginning at Jerusalem, he added, you are witnesses of all these things.
And during these days that Christ spent with his disciples, they gained a new experience.
They heard their beloved master explaining.
And they reached the place where they could say, I know in whom I have believed.
They began to realize the nature and the extent of their own work and to see that they were to proclaim to the world the truths that were entrusted them.
The events of Christ's life, his death, his resurrection, prophecies pointing to these events.
And the mysteries of the plan of salvation all became clear during this time.
Event number five.
The ascension.
He said, I'm going before you.
I'll meet you there.
So they went.
There were 120 there.
Or no, not that event.
There were many there.
Okay.
And they watched as Jesus went into heaven.
And as he left, he gave them the royal commission.
That's number six.
Okay.
The royal commission.
It was a command.
He said, all authority has been given to me in heaven and on earth.
Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you.
And lo, I am with you even to the end of the age.
I'm with you always.
And that's from Matthew 28.
It was the commission and it was a command.
You have a work to do.
And part of this was the promise of the Holy Spirit.
He said, you know, after this, he said, when he was assembled with them together in Jerusalem, so actually before this, he said, don't leave Jerusalem.
Stay here and wait for the promise of the Father, which he said you have heard from me.
For John baptized with water, but you shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now.
So don't leave Jerusalem.
Go back to Jerusalem and wait until the Holy Spirit comes.
And they did.
They went back.
Ten days they waited.
And the upper room was part of that.
The question is, is what did they do during those ten days?
What did they do?
In Acts chapter two, it says when the day of Pentecost had fully come, they were with one accord in one place.
Do you remember Jesus' ministry on earth?
Were they of one accord?
No, they were not.
They were always bickering and grumbling and talking about who is going to have what position in the new government.
You know, I get to be the treasurer.
Well, I'm going to be the prime minister.
They were arguing and bickering among themselves, but when this day came, they were all in one place and they were all of one accord.
So the question begs to be asked is what did they do during those ten days?
We have a spiritual gifts seminar coming up in July, and we're doing kind of a pre-work for that to happen.
Spiritual gifts came as a result of that day.
More on that later.
But what did they do?
Part of your assignment is to read Acts chapter one, two, and three, and chapters, I think, one through four in Acts of the Apostles.
I went through Acts of the Apostles this last week, and I, you know, with the question, what did they do during those ten days before Pentecost?
We often refer to Pentecost as the early rain.
And we are looking forward to the latter rain.
So now we just reviewed the back story.
We're going to see what did they do and then what happened.
They got together and they studied scripture together.
They reviewed what Jesus had taught them during the last 40 days.
They went through all those prophecies and said, yeah, he really is the Messiah.
Yeah, this is what it says.
They were continually in the temple praising and blessing God.
Sometimes I understand what praise is.
Okay, praise is being grateful for who God is.
You know, sometimes we think praise is, well, I'm grateful for this and I'm grateful for that.
Yeah, that's praise, but praise is about who God is and his character.
You know, what impresses you about God's character the most?
You know, his mercy, his grace, his forgiveness, his kind heart.
When you think about those things, those are things you praise God for.
When you praise God when you sing, there's many ways to praise God.
The one that puzzles me, they were continually in the temple praising and blessing God.
How do we bless God?
Have you ever asked yourself that question?
How do we bless God?
He's got it all.
He's got it all, but how do we bless God?
One thing I can think of is we're a blessing to God when we come to him as his child, as his kid.
He's blessed by that.
And he's blessed when we do things that glorify and honor him.
Sometimes I need to get into that and really dig at that one for more, because I know there's more.
How do we bless God?
Anyway, it just sounds funny.
They met together and prayed, presenting their request to the Father in the name of Jesus.
Hmm.
It kind of sounds like they had a prayer meeting every day.
And they all gathered together, and the upper room was the place where they gathered.
They met.
They prayed together.
Number four, they humbled their hearts in true repentance, confessing their unbelief.
Can you imagine being Thomas and being in that group, because he was there?
Jesus had rebuked him for his unbelief, and he would have to say, he was so right.
Jesus was so right, I just didn't believe what he said.
How about Peter?
If you had been Peter in that group, and you humbled your heart in true repentance,
you would have had to have said, hey, guys, I really blew it.
I denied him, but he forgave me.
So they were honest.
They were open with each other, and they confessed their sins.
And they repeated truth from scripture to each other.
So they sat together, and they'd say, do you know what I read this morning?
I read this, and I saw something new here.
I saw how this applies to me.
Or, I saw this, and this is what Jesus wants me to do.
So they were repeating truth from scripture to each other,
and they meditated together on the pure and holy life of Jesus.
They longed to bear witness in their lives to the loveliness of Christ's character.
Their overwhelming desire was to become like Jesus, and they studied who he was,
and they talked about how he treated people.
If you go through the Gospels and you look at the stories,
how did Jesus treat people?
For the most part, he was the kindest person ever.
But, you've got to remember, it wasn't all that way,
because he did have some really pretty straight things to say, too.
So there's time and place for that.
They meditated on his life, and they wanted to be like him.
And they prayed together with intense earnestness for fitness to meet with men,
and to speak words that would lead a sinner to Christ.
So there was a lot going on in their prayer meetings.
They put away all their differences.
They started bickering, and all desire to be, says all desire for supremacy,
all desire for the me first was gone.
This desire to be in charge, to be the first, to be the most, to be the greatest,
that was all put away.
They each wanted to do what they could do, and support everybody else.
And so they became close together in Christian fellowship.
There were days of deep heart searching.
They cried to the Lord for the promise of the Spirit,
because we read the promise, right?
They said, Lord, you promised your Spirit, we want that gift.
And in mind and character, they became like Jesus.
They were all in one place, of one accord.
Were they all alike?
Nope.
Are we all alike?
Nope.
You know, I have some really good friends in this church.
But are we all alike?
Nope.
But do we love each other?
Yes.
That's the key.
They were all of one accord.
They loved each other, and they supported each other's gifts.
Well, and then Pentecost.
And then Pentecost.
Acts 2, 2 and 3.
And suddenly there came a sound from heaven, as of a rushing mighty wind,
and it filled the whole house where they were sitting.
And there appeared to them divided tongues as of fire, and sat on each of them.
Imagine you were just an ordinary citizen in Jerusalem that day.
Was this a silent event?
No.
It was not silent.
It was loud.
It said, a mighty rushing wind.
Do you think it just happened in that house?
I think everybody in Jerusalem heard that whoosh coming through the streets.
And it went into the upper room where they were sitting.
And then a tongue of fire appeared on each of them.
And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit.
Now we're going to look at the results.
What happened as a result of that day?
They were all filled with the Spirit, and they began to speak with other tongues
as the Spirit gave them utterance.
And there were dwelling in Jerusalem, Jews, devout men from every nation under heaven.
And when this sound occurred, the multitude came together and go,
what's happening? What's going on?
They were confused.
Because now suddenly everyone heard them speak, they heard in their own language.
So they were given the gift of tongues.
Or were the people given the gift of hearing?
They heard it in their own tongues.
And they were amazed, and they marveled, saying one to another,
look, are not all these who speak Galileans?
They probably had their own accent.
There's many accents in the United States.
Brooklyn, oh my.
It has its own accent.
As you move, I'm a Westerner, so my accent is very much from the West.
I can't fix that. That's just who I am.
California, Oregon, Washington, Nevada, Utah, Idaho, Montana, and let's see, New Mexico.
We all pretty much talk alike.
You know, we sound alike.
But as you move across the United States, that changes.
That changes, right?
We have made several road trips across the southern part of the United States.
Every time you cross a state line, the accent changes.
It does.
You know, you fill up with gas in Texas, and it's different.
And then you fill up in Oklahoma, and it's different.
And as you just keep going across, the accent changes.
And then you come to Ringgold, Georgia, and we're a cosmopolitan bunch in this church, okay?
Some of us are Georgians.
We were born and bred and raised here.
We sound like we're from Georgia.
I'm not from Georgia, so, you know, people look at me and they say,
you're not from around here, are you?
I go, nope, I'm not, you know?
And the accent varies from place to place, even in Georgia.
One accent that is real clear to me above the many that are around is Chickamauga.
I can hear somebody talking in a store, and I can tell you they're from Chickamauga.
Just by the way they sound.
So here's this crowd that comes together here, and they're saying,
they're talking in my language, probably with the right accent even.
It was a gift of hearing.
And they ask the question, how is it that we hear each in our own language in which we were born?
How is that?
Anyway, that was one of the results of Pentecost, was the gift of speaking in tongues,
or maybe it was the gift of hearing.
And there are modern stories where that has happened as well.
I have talked to people who have been in a foreign country,
and they were impressed to go up and talk to somebody about Jesus.
They didn't know the language, but the person hearing them heard it in their own language.
Pretty cool.
Peter, here's another result, who a short time before was trembling with fear behind a locked door,
stands up and reviews their history as a nation,
preaches Jesus, and fearlessly rebukes those who crucified him.
Well, Peter was pretty bold anyway, but from going to fear to being that bold,
that was a result of the Holy Spirit.
Under the training of Christ, the disciples had been led to feel their need of the Spirit,
and under Spirit's teaching, they received the final qualification and went forth to their life work.
No longer were they ignorant and uncultured.
No longer were they a collection of independent units or discordant conflicting elements.
No longer were their hopes set on worldly greatness.
They were of one accord, of one heart, of one soul.
Christ filled their thoughts, and advancement of his kingdom was their aim.
In mind and character, they had become like the master,
and the men took knowledge of them that they had been with Jesus.
Pentecost brought them a heavenly illumination.
The truths that they could not understand while Christ was with them were now unfolded.
With faith and assurance, they had never before known.
They accepted the teachings of the sacred word.
No longer was it a matter of faith with them that Christ was the Son of God.
They knew that, although clothed with humanity, he was indeed the Messiah,
and they told their experience to the world with the confidence,
which carried with it the conviction that God was with them.
The tidings of a risen Savior as a result of Pentecost were carried to the uttermost parts of the world.
In one generation, the word of Christ went to the entire world.
Europe, Asia, Africa, China, India, Mongolia,
and there is some evidence that it even reached the Americas,
because some of the beliefs of our Native American people really are pretty close to Christianity.
They had to get that idea somewhere.
So there's evidence in every part of the world that it reached the whole world in one generation.
And here's some more results.
As the disciples proclaimed the message of redeeming grace, hearts yielded to the power of this message,
because their hearts were filled with the Spirit.
They were able to give the message in such a way that it was received.
And converts flocked to the church from all directions.
There's a 3,000 in a day, there's 5,000 in a day,
there's baptisms and people flocking to Jesus.
Backsliders were converted.
I'm sure you all know more than one of those.
Or you may be one yourself.
They were converted because of the Holy Spirit.
Every Christian saw in his brother a revelation of divine love and benevolence.
How would we be if that were true for us?
To see in our brothers a revelation of divine love and benevolence,
the ambition of the believers was to reveal the likeness of Christ's character
and to labor for the enlargement of his kingdom.
The apostles gave witness of the resurrection with great power.
Many gave their lives to the spreading of the good news.
There was persecution during those early days.
A lot of it.
And there were pockets of persecution here and pockets of persecution there.
And many gladly gave their lives.
They weren't restrained or intimidated by threatenings.
I don't know about you, but I can be pretty easily intimidated.
I'd like to think I would plant both feet and stay really strong,
but reality check, I can be intimidated fairly easily.
They were not restrained or intimidated by threatenings.
The Lord spoke to them because they were filled with the Spirit.
Miracles were wrought.
Things were moving and things were happening.
Under the Holy Spirit's working, even the weakest, by exercising faith in God,
came to improve their entrusted powers and to become sanctified, refined, and ennoaled.
As in humility, they submitted to the molding influence of the Holy Spirit.
They received the fullness of the Godhead and were fashioned in the likeness of the divine.
There are some verses in the Bible that just blow my mind.
That you may be filled with the fullness of God is one of those.
It's like, whoa.
That's a promise for each of us that we can be filled with the fullness of God.
That's amazing.
With the Spirit came the gifts of the Spirit, subject for July.
Okay?
We're each endowed with natural abilities.
God gives us each special gifts.
But when you add the Holy Spirit to those gifts, it's a great, great power that comes with it.
And sometimes he gives you gifts that you didn't think you had.
Because there's a need for it.
I've had that happen to me.
Things that are just not natural to me have, at times, become natural.
Because it was what was needed at the moment.
There's no lapse of time between the promise and its reception.
Christ is willing to send his Holy Spirit as his representative now, as he was back then.
It's not because of any restriction on his part that the riches of his grace do not flow earthward to men.
The fulfillment of the promise is not seen as it might be.
It is because the promise is not appreciated as it should be.
If all were willing, all would be filled with the Holy Spirit.
And there's more there.
We are still living under the early rain.
We're looking forward to the latter rain, an event which will empower the church to do a mighty work.
But we are living still under the early rain.
And what happened then can happen right now.
What did it do?
What did it take to make that happen?
So we're back to God's eager, he's willing, he wants to fill us with the fullness, with his fullness, with his divine spirit.
He wants to do that.
So what's getting in the way?
What's getting in the way, Abraham? You have an answer for that one.
Ourselves.
I think if we would do what they did, we would have the spirit that God gave them with the power that he gave them.
I'm going to go through that list one more time.
Number one, they studied scripture.
It is so easy not to do that.
I like studying scripture, but I'm telling you, it's really easy not to do it.
I get a 6 a.m. phone call.
My day's gone.
Yeah, Jennifer's shaking her head. Yep, she gets that one, right?
They were continually in the temple praising and blessing God.
Hmm, I wonder what our praise and sharing would be like if we focused on praising and blessing God.
I wonder what that would be like.
They met together and prayed, presenting their requests to the Father in the name of Jesus.
They showed up for prayer meeting.
They humbled their hearts in true repentance, and they confessed their unbelief.
They were vulnerable with each other.
They repeated truth from scripture to each other.
You know, sometimes when I'm doing my devotions, I run across something that just suddenly just opens up.
It's like, wow, I never saw that before.
And I've got to find somebody to share it with.
I have a couple of people on my phone that receive phone calls from me because I know that they like that kind of stuff.
But I might be kind of intimidated to do that with the rest of you.
Some of the rest of you anyways.
But I get excited when I find something new, but I know not everybody wants to hear it.
But these guys, they were doing that with each other all the time.
They meditated on the pure and holy life of Jesus.
Hmm, I should spend how much time a day?
An hour? Reflecting on the life of Jesus.
They prayed with intense earnestness for a fitness to meet men and speak the words that would lead a sinner to Christ.
They prayed for that.
And I know some of you do because I hear you talking about it.
They put away all their differences.
Not just all their differences and all desire for supremacy.
They came close together in Christian fellowship.
There were days of deep heart searching and they were crying out to God for the Holy Spirit.
And then in heart and mind, they became like their Lord.
If we did what they did, would we have the same results?
I think so. I think so.
I think if we did what they did, we would have the same results.
And we would become a mighty power for God's kingdom.
So, I'm not saying I have all the answers, but I'm thinking we ought to plan that way.
We ought to plan that way.
To become part of a body of believers that are filled with the Spirit.
That want nothing more than to share Him with the rest of the world.