12.6.11
THE GIFT OF THE EVANGELIST
INTRO
Today is Pentecost Sunday -- the day in our Church calendar when we remember not so much the Jewish feast, but what took place on that most memorable of all Jewish Pentecost feasts -- the outpouring of the Holy Spirit.
POINT
Some of us may associate the naming of Pentecost with the outpouring of the Holy Spirit. In fact Pentecost was a Jewish feast day that drew thousands to Jerusalem. It just happens that God chose that particular day to pour out his Holy Spirit.
POINT
This morning I am not just going to speak about what happened there and then. I intend to speak about the here and now of what God the Holy Spirit is doing in our world, and what God intends for us through the ongoing work of the Holy Spirit today. And we are going to look at both the OT and NT
POINT
Ezekiel received a vision from God that had both meaning for the people who heard his message, and had further fulfillment in the outpouring of the Holy Spirit that began on the day of Pentecost.
READING Ezekiel 47:1-12
OLD TESTAMENT
1 FILLED WITH THE SPIRIT
The imagery here is an unmistakable description of the power and effect of the Holy Spirit, proceeding from the Father and the Son and as the giver of life.
CONTEXT
1. A VISION OF RESTORATION
Let's not forget that the Jews were in Exile in Babylonia. Ezekiel prophesied during the exile.
Ezekiel had already described the vision of the value of the dry bones, asking the question:
'Can these dry bones live?'
This was a message that was difficult for the people to hear because it was too hard to believe (and too painful if Ezekiel got it wrong)
ILLUSTR
It was a bit like when Loren Cunningham of YWAM prophesied that the Berlin wall would be torn down. The message did not go down well with the German listeners because it would be too painful if the person had got it wrong and their hopes were dashed.
But the vision here of the Dry Bones coming to life is followed up by the imagery of the water flowing from the Temple.
Ezekiel was hearing from God. And the people were restored, just as he had prophesied.
God was indeed going to restore the people to their land and give them new life.
The Vision
- A Trickle turning into a torrential flood (even though there were no tributaries).
Like the vision of the valley of the dry bones this is SYMBOLIC of RESTORATION.
Like will exist again, flowing from Jerusalem, where there was no hope of life existing before.
= The further the water travelled the greater the land flourished. Ankle deep, knee deep, enough to swim in.
APPLIC
God is able to restore his presence, giving new hope to his covenant people when hope is gone. This is not a result of human effort but of divine sovereignty.
It is a picture of:
HEAVEN INVADING EARTH
God's Kingdom come 'As it is in heaven' when the Kingdom comes in full:
cf Rev 22 v1-2 'Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life, as clear as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb downs the middle of the great street of the city. On each side of the river stood the tree of life, bearing twelve crops of fruit, yielding its fruit every month. And the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations.'
It is also a picture of God's Kingdom come 'on earth' where the age to come overlaps with this present age.
APPLIC
It is a picture of the outpouring of the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost:
Gospel proclaimed in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, uttermost parts of the earth
Bringing life where there was no life before.
It is a picture of the new birth of the new believer (the power and presence of the Holy Spirit flowing, like fresh waters into the Dead Sea) in such abundance that life can be supported.
ON INTO THE NEW TESTAMENT
JESUS ILLUSTRATES THE OUTWORKING OF THE SPIRIT PROCEEDING FROM THE FATHER AND THE SON in the way he ministers to others:
READ John 5:1-24 -- Healing at the Pool
POINT
This feast may well have been Pentecost, though we cannot be for certain.
POINT
It is illuminating to see how Jesus went about his ministry because, and how the Holy Spirit gives new life.
Jesus gives a pattern for us to follow.
John 5:19
"the Son can do nothing by himself; he can do only what he sees his Father doing, because whatever the Father does the Son also does.
Remember Jesus also said:
John 15:5
"I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.
POINT Jesus could do only what he saw the Father doing.
Listen for this in the reading this morning:
POINT
So, Jesus could do only what he saw the Father doing.
POINT
Jesus was on a mission. And he trained the disciples to carry on his mission after he had gone.
So it is true to say that 'Mission' is not PRIMARILY an activity of the CHURCH?
It is PRIMARILY an attribute of God. God is a missionary God.
Karl Hartenstein a German missiologist stated: . "It is not the church that has a mission of salvation to fulfill in the world; it is the mission of the Son and the Spirit through the Father that includes the church."
* He saw the obvious truth that God is a missionary God who moves outward towards humanity.
* That God was a missionary God on a mission before the church began its mission.
* That Mission did not begin with the church, but began with God.
* And that it was through God's mission that the church was formed.
POINT
There is only one Mission -- God's Mission, and the church, you and I, are now a part of it. We are caught up in it and we are to carry it on as Jesus did it.
POINT
So, all mission is God's mission.
We don't take God with us on our mission.
We watch and listen to see what God is doing and we go there to stand alongside to work with God.
POINT -- The whole Trinity is involved:
In mission we do the works of the Father, in the power of the Holy Spirit because we have been commissioned to do so by the Son.
It is the later fulfillment of the apocalyptic vision of Ezekiel we read earlier on.
POINT -- HOW DID JESUS DO MISSION?
He said,v17 'My Father is always at his work to this very day, and I, too, am working'
He did what he saw the Father doing
Jesus was referring to the SIGN that had taken place at the Pool of Bethesda:
THE SITUATION at the pool
Every Jewish male would go up to Jerusalem to one of the feasts. Jesus also went. It was while he was there that he came across the great number of disabled people gathered around the Pool of Bethesda.
In Jesus' time people gathered at these porches hoping for a healing miracle. The people had a superstitious belief that when the water was disturbed and angel visited the pool and the first person into the pool would be healed.
The fact was that the pool of Bethesda was an intermittent spring. At times water is released in surges from hidden reservoirs in the hills around the city, causing these springs to rise and fall suddenly.
POINT
It shows just how desperate these people were for a cure.
This particular man had been lame for 38 years, and had lain by the pool for many years.
THE QUESTION: "Do you want to be healed?
POINT
This is not so strange a question as we might imagine.
POINT
This man had more than a physical disability.
There were other limitations on his life:
* In 38 years he had learned no skills to earn a living.
* In 38 years he had made his living through begging.
* In 38 years he had become psychologically dependent on others.
What would healing mean?
* It would mean returning to a world which felt uncertain and unsafe.
* It would mean he could no longer beg.
* It would mean finding some way of making a living in a world in which he was too old to become skilled at a new trade.
APPLIC
When we are led by the Holy Spirit in evangelism we are to engage with people as we find them, just as Jesus did.
Just like the people by the pool at Bethesda there are many superstitious people who sense there must be something more, something missing from their lives, and they are looking in the wrong places.
ANECDOTE
Rev David Robertson -- persuasive evangelism
"The people of Scotland are more open to the Gospel now than 25 years ago, but the Church is less prepared than 25 years ago to communicate it"
Sinclair Ferguson -- Churches in Scotland have given up on expecting conversions.
People haven't rejected the Gospel until they have heard it.
People are superstitious. Jesus was not afraid to go where they were and show them the real power of the Holy Spirit.
Light and Life -- Friday June 17th Bruce Hotel 7.30pm
Volunteers for follow-up needed
BACK TO THE HEALING
John 5:7
"Sir," the invalid replied, "I have no-one to help me into the pool when the water is stirred. While I am trying to get in, someone else goes down ahead of me."
POINT These are the words of a person who has given up hope.
This person's disability now appears to have defined his life.
* There is an expression of helplessness: "I have no-one to help me"
* There is an element of resignation: While I am trying to get in, someone else goes down ahead of me."
POINT
Jesus didn't make it too easy for him.
Jesus DID NOT TAKE NO FOR AN ANSWER because he saw what the Father was doing in this man's life.
APPLIC It is for this reason that we need the presence and power of the Holy Spirit in and on our lives -- so that we can see what the Father is doing in other people's lives.
Jesus first asked the impossible
John 5:8
Then Jesus said to him, "Get up! "Pick up your mat" "walk"
= Don't leave your bed here in order to come back tomorrow.
POINT
The disabled man stood in faith and as he did, the miraculous happened. He was healed instantly, completely and permanently.
RESPONSE OF THE BYSTANDERS
There was a hostile response to what he did from his critics the religious Jews whose concern was that he had done these things on the Sabbath.
- They missed the MIRACLE.
- And they missed the SIGN.
Instead they began a movement that led to the death of Jesus.
The Law of Moses did say that the Jews were to keep the Sabbath and not do any work on that day.
The rabbis had carefully studied the regulation, and, had spelled out 39 different ways by which the Sabbath could be violated by certain types of work.
One of those ways was carrying any kind of a load on the Sabbath day.
Jesus explains why he broke the tradition:
John 5:17
Jesus said to them, "My Father is always at his work to this very day, and I, too, am working."
Jesus also said: John 5:19
the Son can do nothing by himself; he can do only what he sees his Father doing, because whatever the Father does the Son also does.
POINT
Jesus saw and did what the Father was doing.
POINT/APPLIC
As we continue to work out or Action Plan we should constantly be asking:
* 'What do we see the Father doing?
* And how can we shape what we do to work with the Father?
Jesus was not afraid to ignore tradition or convention when he knew the Father's will. And neither should we be afraid.
RECAP -- Summary so far:
* So what are we finding out here?
* That there is only one Mission -- God's mission
* That Mission is primarily the mission of God the Father
* That Jesus was sent to the works of the Father in the power of the Holy Spirit
* That the Church is now sent by Jesus to do the works of the Father in the power of the Holy Spirit
CLOSING
On this the Day of Pentecost the vision of Ezekiel continues to be fulfilled around the world where astronomical growth of the Christian Church continues to take place.
RELIABLE STATISTICS COLLATED BY THE PRAYER FOUNDATION:
On June 15th, 2006, 3,000,000 believers paraded through Sao Paolo, Brazil in the world's largest "March for Jesus" (William Stearns).
The number of Christians in Indonesia has grown from 1.3M forty years ago to over 11M today. That said, of the 76,000 villages in the country, 50,000 are without a church (Operation World).
About 500 Muslims come to faith in Christ every month in Iran--a country ranked among the top ten persecutors of Christians in the world. Many of the new believers are young, since 70% of Iran is under the age of 30 (Vision 2020).
Every day, 20,000 Africans come to Christ. Africa was 3% Christian in 1900 and is now over 50% Christian (Vision 2020).
In 1900 Korea had no Protestant church and the country was deemed impossible to penetrate. Today Korea is 30% Christian with 7000 churches in Seoul alone and several of these churches have over 1,000,000 members (Vision 2020).
There are currently 60-80 million Christians in China with between 10,000-25,000 converts a day (Open Doors).
It's happening like this elsewhere in the world. Let's pray on for a new outpouring here, and in the meantime seek to listen well to the Father that we may do his works.
