If I ascend to heaven, thou art there! Jesus was crucified during the Passover celebration. Eighth, some OT believers were enabled by the Spirit to do extraordinary feats of power to help God's people. These are the ones who follow the Lamb wherever He goes. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, 4 in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. In one sense, all craftsmanship and artistic ability is a gift of God, just like our breath is. The disciples had seen what would happen because Christ was arrested and had come before the high priest. "Also for this very reason, giving all diligence into your faith virtue, to virtue knowledge, to knowledge self-control, to self-control perseverance, to perseverance godliness, the divine nature. Which again points forward to the last days inaugurated at Pentecost. Thomas replied, You are my Lord and my God! And they did, and thousands were added to the Church that day. Every minister's dream, to give one sermon and thousands of people get baptized and join the Church in one day, every minister's fantasy. That is the vision that Jesus has for His Church as articulated by the apostle Paul in Ephesians 4:16 Ephesians 4:16From whom the whole body fitly joined together and compacted by that which every joint supplies, according to the effectual working in the measure of every part, makes increase of the body to the edifying of itself in love.American King James Version, and they had it at this moment. (1 Cor., 148 pp., XI, 8-22). Then the disciples were glad when they saw the Lord. https://www.bible.com/bible/392/JHN.20.19-29.CEV. After Pentecost, a radical transformation took place. Send inquiries regarding the operation of this Web site to webmaster@ucg.org. . As Jesus' disciples they may be afraid of someone that would deliver them to soldiers to punish them for taking part in 'rebellion' (as occupants may see it). They were alone. They drank it, they washed in it, it watered their crops and turned their mill-wheels. . Surely we have need today of men and women filled by the Spirit to expose and denounce evils in our society that are hardly blinked at any more: the exploitation of women's bodies and debasement in advertising, the unconscionable destruction of human life through abortion on demand, the maneuvers of our own country to destabilize other governments, the gross waste and gluttony of American life, the cavalier attitude to divorce and remarriage which God hates, and the multi-million dollar promotion of alcohol and cigarettes as anything less than family-destroyers and body-killers. They understood their problem, in verse 38, "He said to them, 'Why are you troubled and why do doubts arise in your hearts?'" But Jesus immediately said to them: 'Take courage! And so they didn't really think about that, and yet all of a sudden it came upon them. INTRODUCTION Jesus told the disciples to wait for the power of the Holy Spirit before doing ministry. In the New Testament, Elisabeth, John the Forerunner's mother, was filled with Spirit as she saw the pregnant Virgin, and she prophesied immediately (Luke 1:39-41) and so did the old widow-prophetess Anna at vision of Jesus taken to the temple (Luke 2:36-38); John the Forerunner himself was filled with Holy Spirit from his childhood (Luke 1:15), and of course the apostles, even before the Pentecost, had a degree of presence of Spirit in them (at least no less than John the Forerunner), through which presence they could act miracles; they got even to a greater degree of intensity the gift of the Spirit, when Jesus - before the Pentecost - blew in them the Spirit and added to them (through this new dimension of the presence of Spirit) an ability to forgive sins (John 20:22). You ever been in that type of situation where you don't know what to do next? Another reason, I suspect, is because they were overwhelmed with disappointment by Jesus' arrest. And this express bus took Route 66 out of St. Louis all the way to Los Angeles, my first time to get on that fabled highway, Route 66. The hated Samaritans and the occupying Romans were both shown to be within the reach of the grace of God. It was by God's Spirit that the prophets spoke to the people God's Word (Nehemiah 9:30), and it was by the Spirit that the people were enabled to grasp and apply the Word. Even though they had seen miracles, again, another indication to us always to remember that miracles are important, miracles can be faith-builders, but miracles by themselves will not do it all. Surely for a Christian all study and all creative work must justify itself in terms of love. He quotes Joel, he quotes Psalms and he gives interpretations upon those scriptures, here in chapter 1, no one had ever heard of before. It's an interesting way that they did. If we can borrow a phrase that we've used over the last two years, two phrases, they labored in the Word and they lived in the Word. And this dramatic miracle took place, of wind, and fire, and language, and hearing, and people took notice. If we can learn to take on the divine nature and drink that in, in our lives, then we can banish doubt, uncertainty, and fear, unbelief, that will creep in at various times as we go through our lives, and stages in the developments of life. They had been told to be there, to wait in Jerusalem until that day. When the disciples saw the Lord, they became very happy. And had they seen anything near that type of an ecstatic demonstration, it might have been in a form by someone doing something by their form of religion that they didn't identify with. How does a fan in a turbofan engine suck air in? That Christianity grew, after such a brief inception, into the world religion we know to today is testimony to the power of the message Jesus preached. At what point of what we watch as the MCU movies the branching started? Show them otherwise what had been done, rebuke their unbelief, as it goes along here. However, of course, the apostles had smack of the Spirit even before, for even before Spirit was present in them to a certain degree and intensity; they possessed the Spirit-ual gifts even before the Pentecost, however the gifts of the Infinite Spirit are also infinite and at the Pentecost they got a greater share of this graceful infinity, so as to totally be absorbed in it. How could they have ever submitted to God's law and pleased himas many did, like Abel and Noah and Abraham and Moses and Rahab and Ruth and Deborah and David? And yet, they had not been able to completely separate the fact that now what they were part of was the real, the real thing, because Christ had died. Suddenly, Jesus appeared in the middle of the group. As the Father has sent Me, I also send you." And when He had said this, He breathed on them, and said to them, "Receive the Holy Spirit. Matthew 71:seventeen, XVII, 10-18, and on the Sabbath (beginning): Rome, 111:seventeen, XIII, 1-10. And I was going to go out to California, my first trip to California, visit my brother for about three weeks. And so they had become a part of something that again, they were still trying to understand. He greeted them and showed them his hands and his side. 1. These significant events from the life of Jesus are made easier to comprehend and better-illustrated thanks to the passages . The Jewish authoritiesthe Sanhedrin, the Scribes, the Pharisees, the Sadduceesthat authority was intact in Jerusalem, running the temple, running the religious side of the culture and the social life of Judea under the Roman cap, and it too was a very, very powerful force you didn't run up against. Third, the OT believers enjoyed the constant presence of God's Spirit. Why are you standing around gazing? They were kind of like this, and like this. Biblical Hermeneutics Stack Exchange is a question and answer site for professors, theologians, and those interested in exegetical analysis of biblical texts. etc.'. It wasn't a common manifestation of the Spirit, but it was real then and it is today. The old creation had a sabbath, and the new creation requires a sabbath as well. And Peter thence begins to quote Scripture. Or: "The Spirit of the Lord came mightily upon him and the ropes which were on his arms became as flax" (15:14). Seventh, the saints of old experienced victory over fear by the presence of the Spirit. But after Pentecost the power of the Spirit spread out to light the whole world. They were going up against a lot, just as we go up against our world today, and ourselves, and what Satan might throw at us. There was doubt. The country folk downstream depended on it. They'd likely not seen it. That's the famous road to Emmaus experienced from the book of Luke, "and they went and told it to the rest, but they did not believe them either." Peter says, "Repent, believe, be baptized, you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit." The vision of the Church was coming together and the mission of the Church was being accomplished. That is what caused them to banish their fear, trouble, doubt, and unbelief: Christ in them through the Holy Spirit. So, as Jesus Christ was teaching His disciples to focus on the things pertaining to the Kingdom of God during the time between His resurrection and Pentecost, we can be focusing on that now too. So Jesus had to rebuke them. By using our website, you accept our use of cookies as described in our Privacy Policy. The Feast of Pentecost, or Shavuot in Hebrew, was just starting in Jerusalem as the book of Acts begins. So He begins to teach them from the Scriptures that they might understand, and that they might comprehend what He was and how He had fulfilled everything that they would have understood to one degree, and then even more they had begun to develop a fuller understanding of the prophecies of Isaiah, or Joel, or Jeremiah, or Ezekiel, the statements about the Messiah. All of our resources exist to guide you toward everlasting joy in Jesus Christ. 2930), "When thou takest away their breath, they die and return to their dust. The same things were going through their minds that go through our minds. Egypt's President Nasser announced the plan for construction in 1953. Now, when we turn over to Acts chapter 1, and we look at, kind of summing up of this as it is. And they chose Matthias by casting lots. I happen to think that they, no doubt during this period of time, as the days go on they talked and they read. That's how I imagine it and He was home, He was back at, He was at the third heaven. But they saw Him for a period of time, and that's how I like to imagine it. United Church of Godis a501(c)3organization. Welcome to BH. It gives me a lot of encouragement, when I am called to go places where I feel insecure, to know that the Spirit is within to give me the words I need and that he is also already in the place where I am going to prepare the way and to hold me when I get there. What do we do now? Although Thomas the Twin was one of the twelve disciples, he wasn't with the others when Jesus appeared to them. What are some tools or methods I can purchase to trace a water leak? Probably the Spirit was their instructor in two senses. If we can make that decision and live with that reality that there is a God who lives, and before Him we stand every single day of our life and every major decision, every small decision of character, and the decisions that we make in the privacy of our own mind, and in our own actions that not everyone knows about, not even our mate, all are in accordance with righteousness and a desire for righteousness. We know in Acts chapter 2, when we turn there and look at the story alluded to in the sermonette here this morning, that they were gathered together. So there was still this not fully developed confidence and faith in what had happened, and so He goes even further and asks for some food. He used Deborah and the tribe of Zebulun (the mountain may have been in their land) in the sermon. And more specifically for this group that they would be witnesses of Jesus in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and to the ends of the earth being fulfilled. 38Whoever believes in me, as Scripture has said, rivers of living water will flow from within them. 39By this he meant the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were later to receive. It is rooted in the Word of God. The Victory over Fear On the day of the Pentecost, The Spirit of God came to them, filled their minds and their hearts and their entire being. The Key to a Life Well Lived. rev2023.3.1.43269. And you can begin to imagine how this dynamic begins to must have been being set up within the disciples, because when you begin to doubt one another, you begin to lose trust. From this point, they had only 10 days. The world sees a mechanical process of evolution and natural selection. Go, therefore, make disciples of nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded, and lo, I am with you, always, even to the end of the age.'" He had a lot to come back, he was at the back of the pack. It says, "The eleven disciples went away into Galilee, to the mountain which Jesus had appointed for them. Was Galileo expecting to see so many stars? I also think this is true in some way, but in gospels there is record that Jesus 'gave them authority over devils and diseases and sent them to preach gospel, to heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead. After the disciples received the Holy Spirit, received Christ in them, they began to operate under the strength and ability of Christ in them. Is there a way to only permit open-source mods for my video game to stop plagiarism or at least enforce proper attribution? The people who have faith in me without seeing me are the ones who are really blessed!. Tradition places the receiving of the Spirit on Pentecost in the upper room of Acts 1. And in their mouth was found no deceit, for they are without fault before the throne of God.". We can take on that nature and we can live. The indwelling Holy Spirit was only sent after Jesus' resurrection. Trials hit us that will shake our faith, test our faith. It is a remarkable period of church history, because right here we have a vision being fulfilled that Jesus Christ has for His Church. 1 When the day of Pentecost came, they were all together in one place. So if I can come back to the question that I asked, what was going through their mind on that morning of Pentecost? In 2 Peter chapter 1, 2 Peter chapter 1, Peter writes, "Grace and peace be multiplied to you and the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord. The Sadducees were more focused on the Five Books of Moses than the history and prophets. Everybody who gets up and gives a sermon in a congregation, that sermon before it's ever posted on a website, has been reviewed or at least approved by individuals within the congregation. They looked upon them then as liars, charlatans, or fools, maybe a bit delusional. When I got off the bus from my hometown, I was in this large room, this large terminal, it was as larger, even larger than this room here, which for me, from my small town was a pretty big thing to walk into, and I did, first time I had ever traveled. He said He wouldn't and He didn't, even though there was a moment in time when they thought that they were orphaned, as they stood gazing up and looking and wondering, "What do we do next. As I was sitting there gazing around, nobody came. Jesus continued: "Truly I tell you, when you were younger, you would tie your belt and walk wherever you wanted. Were on a mission to change that. The Disciples' Sprititual Strength. Though a miracle had taken place in front of them, that still wasn't enough to remove the doubt and fear. Could it mean that apostles had just some spiritual gifts like healing before Pentecost, but after it they received gift of prophesy and gift of tongues? It goes on, "When He had spoken these things," in verse 9, "they watched and He was taken up in a cloud, received Him out of their sight. When they heard that He was alive and had been seen by her, they did not believe. An eyewitness account, there was a lack of belief that put them in the situation here that they did not understand and didn't believe that had actually happened. Verse 41, "But while they still did not believe for joy, and marveled, He said to them, 'Have you any food?'" " They were able to do the things Jesus gave them authority to do and they found it amazing. We just get a few snippets from the gospel accounts, at least, of this 40-day period. They turned the world upside down because they fully understood two simple . LISTEN NOW. This then begins to be the anchor and the soil into which they can anchor a life of faith that they were to have and to develop. And I didn't know how to make a connection. Was the power they received in Matthew 10 different from the one they received in Acts 2? To be candid, it does feel like a complete change of the subject. 'It's a ghost,' they said, and cried out in fear. [Darris McNeely] On the morning of Pentecost 31 AD, what do you think was going through the minds of the assembled disciples in Jerusalem? But it is also due to a much simpler and . And I think there was and is today a special touch or filling of the Holy Spirit that elevates the work of an artist or a musician or a craftsman from mere technical skill to divinely empowered ministry that exalts God and builds faith. Did, and fire, and that 's how I imagine it and he was the... 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