Have you ever seen something unexplainable and wondered what it meant? This is a common occurrence when traveling in another country. It may be a conversation by natives or a sign or some gathering of people that appears different than our customs. I recall seeing a truck load of people dressed in their finest clothes when first arriving in Albania several years ago. I had no idea what was taking place. But upon asking, I found out quickly that this was a customary wedding celebration, honking horns, decorating the truck, and joyfully driving through the city streets.
The city of Jerusalem was a bustling place during the harvest Feast of Weeks known as Pentecost. Many had come to be part of this celebration to commemorate God's bounty to them in the first harvest of the year. Others had come to pilgrimage in Jerusalem or to study there or to just soak up the richness of Jewish heritage. It was during this period of time in 30 AD that something unexplainable happened. The cryptic question of verse 12 sets the tone for the balance of the chapter, "What does this mean?"
Jesus had already promised the coming of the Spirit. On a much earlier occasion, Jesus stood at the latter harvest feast, the Feast of Booths, and offered one of the most profound invitations the world has ever heard:
"If any man is thirsty, let him come to Me and drink. He who believes in Me, as the Scripture said, 'From his innermost being shall flow rivers of living water.'" But this He spoke of the Spirit, whom those who believed in Him were to receive; for the Spirit was not yet given, because Jesus was not yet glorified. (John 7:37-39)
The promise of the Spirit coming to indwell the one who believed in Christ marked a new epoch in history. Now, God Himself would not only come redemptively to man, but would indwell him, satisfying him with the constant flow of living waters. This was the Messianic age, a new era in which all of the glorious promises of the Old Testament prophets would be fulfilled. As Isaiah, Ezekiel, Joel and other prophets pointed out, the coming of Messiah would bring about a new relationship to God through His Spirit.
Pentecost introduces us to this work of the Spirit which we presently enjoy. If you strip away the work of the Spirit, you have taken the life out of Christianity. If you distort the work of the Spirit, then you have created an aberration of Christianity. Seeing what Pentecost is all about can help us respond appropriately to the Holy Spirit and His work in our lives.
How essential is it for us to understand the Holy Spirit and His work? John Stott, in his characteristically clear way, explains this essential understanding of the Spirit introduced to us in the book of Acts.
Without the Holy Spirit, Christian discipleship would be inconceivable, even impossible. There can be no life without the life-giver, no understanding without the Spirit of truth, no fellowship without the unity of the Spirit, no Christlikeness of character apart from his fruit, and no effective witness without his power. As a body without breath is a corpse, so the church without the Spirit is dead. [The Spirit, the Church, and the World, 60]
With this in mind, let's see what Pentecost is all about by noticing three distinct actions that took place at this foundation point of the visible Church.
I. The Coming of the Spirit
Jesus had told the disciples to wait in Jerusalem for the Spirit's coming. Their waiting and their praying was not the cause of the Spirit coming. This was on God's agenda just as Calvary was only seven weeks earlier. As we saw in our last study, Pentecost is an unrepeatable event just as Calvary is an unrepeatable event. The necessary work God intended in both those divine events were fulfilled, and in both of them, the wondrous results continue through eternity.
The phenomena of the Spirit's coming at Pentecost offers us a better understanding of what God accomplished and continues to do through the ministry of the Spirit.
1. Sovereignly
The disciples were all together on the day of Pentecost, presumably in one large room which we call "The Upper Room." The disciples really did not understand all that was going to transpire. They only knew that Jesus had told them to wait in Jerusalem for the promise of the Father which He was sending to them. So they obeyed and made spiritual preparations for whatever the Lord might do in them.
"And suddenly" shows that what was happening had nothing to do with the pleadings of the disciples. They were not trying to call the Spirit down from heaven. They were 'waiting' or preparing themselves for the work of God. The Spirit then suddenly, without any kind of warning, invaded that small band of believers in His mighty, cleansing power.
The point that Luke is making by this phrase is that the Spirit's coming is unmanipulated by any person. This was the sovereign act of an Almighty God fulfilling His redemptive plan for His people! Our God does as He pleases for His own eternal glory. He comes to us personally, as well as corporately, in the Holy Spirit. He comes to fulfill His Kingdom's purpose in history through the great work of the Spirit.
2. Powerfully
In this sudden movement, the first detection by the disciples was a sound. "And suddenly there came from heaven a noise like a violent, rushing wind." In contrast to the 'still, small voice' in which God revealed Himself to Elijah while covering himself in the cave, God the Spirit thunders into the lives of the redeemed at Pentecost.
The words clearly indicate something noticeable. The word "noise" was used in Luke's gospel for the roar of the sea (Luke 21:25). The Psalmist echoes this idea in Psalm 29:3-5a, 7-9.
The whole idea of "power" is conveyed in the voice of the Lord, just as His power is evident in the "noise" of the Spirit's coming. Added to this are the words, "a violent, rushing wind," which gives you the idea of a wind of tornadic proportions saturating the house. The "wind" is a common word used to symbolize the Spirit in both Old and New Testaments. The Hebrew has just one word, ruach, for both Spirit and wind, just as the Greek, pnuema, is used in the same way.
This audible coming of the Spirit is said to have "filled the whole house where they were sitting." That is, the people in the house were totally "immersed" in the Spirit. This, my brethren, is the baptism of the Spirit of which every believer partakes. In His initial coming the Spirit descended from heaven in a unique way, but the effect of what He does is just the same. He baptizes us into the Body of Christ; He makes us a partaker of Christ; He places us firmly and securely in Christ; He joins us together, in the same Spirit, to all of the redeemed; He satisfies us deeply by letting us drink of the same fountain of living waters; He applies all of the power of the cross and resurrection to our sinful lives. "For by one Spirit we were all baptized into one body, whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free; and we were all made to drink of one Spirit" (I Cor. 12:13). We must not think that the Spirit's baptizing work lacks power today. My friend, when you enter into a faith relationship to Christ, this same Holy Spirit comes in purifying power in your life. We do not hear a sound, but He leaves that same radical effect upon our lives.
3. Permanently
The next phenomenon, "tongues as of fire," offers us a marvelous picture of what the Spirit was doing. "And there appeared to them tongues as of fire distributing themselves, and they rested on each one of them." First, the disciples had heard the Spirit coming. Now they would actually see the Spirit descending and resting upon them in what appeared to be fire shaped like tongues.
What was this sight? It seems that this appearance of fire, as the disciples observed it, came as one singular body, then broke out upon the heads of each disciple. It shows that the Spirit falls upon every believer, not just an elite few. It shows that He gives unity to the entire Body of Christ as this same fire rested upon each one singularly. With the appearance being fire, it obviously presents us with the idea of purity, as observed in Isaiah's striking vision of a burning coal from the altar being placed upon his lips to purify him.
Fire also symbolized the presence of the Lord. There was the fire of the Shekinah glory that led the children of Israel at night. There was the fire that came forth from the altar to consume those who had defiled the altar (Lev. 10:1-2). There was the Lord speaking from the midst of the fire (Deut. 4:11-12), so that Moses stated, "Our God is a consuming fire" (Deut. 4:24). Those tongues of fire demonstrated that God had come to His people to dwell in them and to constantly be with them. His presence is ever near for those who know Him. He abides in us, purifying us as a holy people unto Him.
John the Baptist had already prophesied that Jesus would baptize with the Holy Spirit and with fire (Matt. 3:11). Now this prophecy was fulfilled. The visible appearance of the Spirit's coming showed a permanency to His work. In the Old Testament we see the Spirit coming at various points upon God's people. Now He comes at Pentecost to dwell permanently in the redeemed!
4. Purposefully
The Spirit also now "filled" the disciples. The filling differs from the baptism. The baptism is common to every believer. We are never told in Scripture to seek the baptism of the Spirit nor to pray for the baptism of the Spirit. This baptism is simultaneous with our justification. But the filling of the Spirit is another matter. We are commanded to be continually filled with the Spirit (Eph. 5:18). Infillings may take place often, as we will see when we get further along in Acts. He fills us to enable us for service, not for self-consumption, nor for personal attention. The filling of the Spirit is not to make us feel better but to empower us in worship, witness, and service. The baptism of the Spirit is unrepeatable, sovereignly given at justification, and necessary for immersing you into Christ. The filling of the Spirit is repeatable, commanded--so therefore something for which we ask and seek, and necessary for effective worship and service.
With this in mind, I think it is important to note that the gift of speaking with other tongues followed the filling of the Spirit. This is one of the most misunderstood and misinterpreted areas of Scripture. So let's notice a few things about it.
First, speaking in tongues was not a precedent nor an evidence of believers beyond Pentecost being "baptized in the Spirit." If that was the case, then there would of necessity have to be the other two phenomena of the "sound of a violent, rushing wind" and "tongues" as of fire resting upon a person's head. You cannot lift this phenomena out of its context and make it normative for every believer.
Second, the kind of tongues mentioned in this verse and throughout the book of Acts were known languages. The entire text is quite clear on this. Notice the three words just in verse 4 that relate to this. They "began to speak" is the Greek word commonly used for human speech (laleo) throughout the New Testament. Next, "with other tongues," distinguishes that the kind of speaking taking place was with "different languages." The word "other" implies "other than their own" (heterais) tongues, that is, tongues not native to their own. The word "tongues" (glossai) refers to languages, not ecstatic utterances or unintelligible speech.
This is clearly demonstrated in verses 5-11, since the known languages in which they were speaking were identified by the countries represented. The comment in verses 6 and 8 of hearing in their own "language" is the word "dialect" (dialektos), which means one's manner of speech. Many of these languages were similar in background and sound yet different; just as the Swiss language is similar to the German language today, but the Swiss is considered a dialect.
Third, it was the Spirit "giving them utterance," not anything contrived, forced, imitated, or manipulated. The word "utterance" is yet another word for speech with an emphasis on "declarative speech or oracular utterances" (apophtheggomai).
This brings us to the whole purpose of the "other tongues." As evidence that the Messianic age had come and that the promises of the Old Testament related to Messiah were fulfilled, these uneducated Galileans were communicating the "mighty deeds of God" in the native languages of this cosmopolitan gathering at Pentecost. Rather than a mass of gibberish, each person listening was hearing these men and women giving testimony in their own language. No one was in the dark as to what was being said. Each was being communicated to in an understandable way. The filling of the Spirit was not without purpose! He fills that we might speak "of the mighty deeds of God" to a lost world!
If you have ever been in Kennedy Airport or another of the larger airports in their international section, you can understand a bit more of what was happening. In this kind of setting, you may hear people from a dozen countries carrying on conversations in their native tongues while you are waiting in a line. As soon as someone speaks English, your ears zero in on the conversation so that you focus on what they are saying. At Pentecost, the band of disciples speaking various languages were doing so quite simultaneously, yet it did not bring confusion, because each person heard the mighty deeds of God in his own dialect. It did not matter what the other languages were saying to that man who heard in his own tongue. He just knew that he understood clearly.
II. The Identifying of Believers
We are so accustomed to Christianity that we can easily take it for granted. But consider that in 30 AD there were literally only a handful of Christians. We probably could have put all of them in our church building and have room to spare. People had heard about Christ, but much of what they thought was construed in a negative way by the Jewish religious leaders. Who were these Christians anyway? The Spirit of God does a clear work in our lives that the child of God might be identified as a believer in the midst of a lost world.
1. By the supernatural element
The supernatural element of the noise which sounded like a violent, rushing wind, caught the attention of the multitudes. They heard the sound and came together in much the same way as people in a neighborhood will find their way to the sound of a siren that is blaring in their neighborhood. But what caught the multitude off-guard was hearing this group of Galileans speaking in their own languages. The Spirit had distinctively worked in these believers so that the masses understood that they were different from everyone else.
In much the same way, the Holy Spirit continues this work in believers today. While we may not see the unusual phenomena witnessed at the unique coming of the Spirit at Pentecost, we are still affected by the Spirit's work in such a way that He distinguishes us from the world about us. And He does this in a supernatural way, as well.
For instance, when you are able to love an unlovable person at your workplace, how can you explain this in worldly terms? When you have a peace of heart and mind while undergoing great trials, how can you explain this without the supernatural element?
I thought again of what Dale Head told me about his good friend, Len Hoppe, who went home to be with the Lord last year. Len was in his forties and in seemingly good health when he discovered that he had a large tumor metastasized to his lung. He had a marvelous peace throughout the entire ordeal of diagnosis, tests, and facing surgery. He never came out of the hospital after his surgery. The thing that caught my attention was when Dale said that Len's fellow employees could not understand how he could be so at peace when facing certain death. The only way to explain it is by the supernatural element at work in Len's life as a believer.
The Holy Spirit is working, even when we don't realize it, in supernatural fashion, to identify you as a child of God in the midst of a corrupt world. I think we have to ask ourselves, is there anything in my life that can only be explained by the supernatural work of God's Spirit?
2. To raise questions
Is this identification for your personal pleasure or aggrandizement? No, but it is to create questions in the minds of unbelievers. One of the necessary parts of preparing someone for the gospel is for them to begin to ask questions. It may be, "Why do I exist?" or "What is wrong with my life?" or "What will happen to me after I die?" In the case of our text we see the question, "What does this mean?" in verse 12.
Now what would you have done if you had been part of the 120 disciples in the Upper Room when the Holy Spirit invaded your life in great power and a crowd began to ask, "What does this mean?" Would that be time to huddle for prayer meetings? Would it be a time to say, "I'll explain that later, right now I need to go study..."? My friend, you would begin at that point explaining the reason for the distinct difference in your life--Jesus Christ the Lord!
Part of the problem in evangelism today is that our lives are not raising enough questions. We are too much like the world, rather than holy unto the Lord. We try to see how close we can get to acting and talking like the world, rather than seeing how close we can get to living like a believer!
The Holy Spirit is working in us. Let's make sure that we do nothing to hinder nor quench His work in identifying us as believers in the midst of a dark world.
III. The Preaching of the Church
Everyone did not appreciate what they saw and heard. While some asked questions, others mocked, accusing the disciples of being "full of sweet wine," which was wine made from grain. How does the church respond to both questions and mocking? That is what we face in our day, so we need to learn from the apostolic pattern.
We are to preach Jesus Christ! There are so many things substituted today for the preaching of the gospel of Christ. Rather than confronting the age, we seem to want to coddle it and pet it. Peter's message, on behalf of the entire group of believers, shows that the Christian message is still best presented in the preaching of the Word of God.
1. Refutation
In verse 14 we find the beginning of what is obviously a shortened version of Peter's sermon at Pentecost. It is striking, for in the opening remarks Peter refutes the careless mocking of those opposed to the gospel in Jerusalem. Though the atmosphere was still tense over the crucifixion of Christ, Peter had no hesitation at leveling both barrels at the foolishness of the world.
He called upon them to listen or give ear (lit. v. 14) to his words. He shows the foolishness of their remarks about the sweet wine by pointing out that it was 9 AM and not even the drunkards were drunk at that time. Then he points to Scripture to under gird the practice of the disciples. They could explain themselves from Scripture.
This is an important point to see. Our experience should never be used to interpret the Word of God. Rather, the Word should always be the gauge and standard by which our experience is judged. That's what Peter was doing. It was as if he was saying, "You see us. You see how unusual we are. This is not strange! This is simply what God had promised through the prophet Joel concerning the Spirit."
Proper preaching will refute the gainsayers through the Word of God rather than by worldly means. We are called to explain ourselves (I Peter 3:15). The Spirit enables us to do so boldly and with great wisdom.
2. Explanation
While Peter begins his explanation of "What does this mean?" by quoting from the book of Joel, he uses this as the groundwork for proclaiming the gospel of Jesus Christ. If you analyze what he had to say, you will notice proclamation based upon doctrine. He was proclaiming Jesus Christ, but not in a vapid, cutesy way. He gave them truths that both exhorted action but explained how salvation came about.
One of the most important things that any believer can do is that of explaining the gospel of Jesus Christ with clarity and accuracy. So many evangelicals neglect explaining the gospel and instead, jump to urging the unbeliever to "make a decision," even though he does not understand what he is deciding! We will see in our next study of this chapter that Luke gives the essence of what Peter told the multitudes. He gave them a very doctrinal message.
The early believers were not afraid to use doctrine in explaining the gospel. As a matter of fact, they saw it as essential in their work as evangels declaring the good news of Christ. They really believed that "the gospel is the power of God unto salvation to all who believer" (Rom. 1:16).
What does this have to do with the Holy Spirit? It is the Spirit who works through the Word of God to change the hearts of sinners. It is the Word of God applied by the effectual working of the Spirit that takes root in a heart and produces conversion. the Holy Spirit fills and empowers us to speak the Word, giving clear explanation to point sinful men to the cross of Christ.
Conclusion
The life of the church is the Holy Spirit. That's why Paul says of the church, "in whom you also are being built together into a dwelling of God in the Spirit" (Eph. 2:22).
My brethren, let's not give sleep to our eyes until we know that we are yielded to the Sprit and under His control. Let's not try to serve Christ in merely our own strength, but do so in the power of the Spirit. Let's not be afraid of the Spirit's work in our lives, but pray that He might reveal Christ in us and through us to our lost world!
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