What Happened In the Upper Room?
Acts 2: 1/4
Let us take a trip back to the Day of Pentecost where in the Upper Room one hundred and twenty men and women had gathered to wait for the promise of the Father, where the church was birthed with power and great glory.
Everything had been prepared, with Divine precision. The Lamb had been slain, the blood applied and Jesus is know seated at the right hand of the Majesty on High. And the disciples are gathered in the Upper Room at the command of the Master.
Men and Women who had been ruled by their senses are suddenly born into the spirit realm. They had now received the nature of God never again to be ruled by evil forces. The sin problem had been settled, and they had become New Creatures, created in Christ Jesus.
Gathered there in the Upper Room, unaware that they had inherited a New Covenant that was initiated when they were born of the Spirit. They had not awakened to the fact that it was a spiritual circumcision instead of physical. That God had taken away their stony heart and written a new law in their heart of flesh.
Under the old Covenant God had a nation, but now He has a family born from above, born of the Spirit. Under the Old Covenant it was God appearing to them, now it’s God in them. The fellowship of bitter herbs was replaced with the sweet fellowship of the Holy Spirit to be enjoyed with the Father, through the Lord Jesus Christ.
When the Holy Spirit came they heard a rushing as of a mighty wind and there were Tongues of Fire. And they were heard speaking in tongues, acting strange and were accused of being drunk. But Peter replies saying, “These men are not drunk as ye suppose, but this is that spoken by the prophet Joel.”
The disciples heard Jesus teach about the Kingdom of God, but knew nothing of righteousness, or about redemption, they had arrived but did not know it. They had received Eternal Life; the Holy Spirit was dwelling in them, the promise of the Father that they had waited for had now come.
They were filled with joy unspeakable and full of glory, and heavenly peace had filled their hearts. They had become the righteousness of God in Christ. And now each believer could enter into the Holy of Holies with no condemnation.
The Urim and Thummim that we read about in the Old Testament, those two stones in the breastplate of the High Priest which was a representation of lights and perfecting, had now taken up residence in the life of the believers.
Let us look at what had happened from a scriptural stand point. In the book of 1 Corinthians 12:13 “For by one Spirit we are all baptized into one body, whether Jew or Greek whether bond or free, and were all made to drink of one Spirit.” And the prophet Joel had stated, “And it shall come to pass afterward, that I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh.”
Then we hear the words of John the Baptist saying, “I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance; but he that comes after me is mightier than I, whose shoes I am not worthy to bear: he shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost, and with fire.” And Jesus stated in John’s gospel, “If any man thirst let him come unto me, and drink. He that believes on me as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow river of living water.”
These scriptures give us insight into what was taking place in the Upper Room. The moment they were immersed in the Spirit, they were born again.
You cannot be born unless you come out of a womb, and they had come forth from the womb of the Holy Ghost and received eternal life.
This was the first time that man received the Nature of God, it’s true that Jesus received Eternal Life before His resurrection but He is not classed with us. “He is the Head of the body, the church, who is the beginning, the first born from the dead that in all things He might have the preeminence.”
A strange phenomenon had taken place in the Upper Room. Tongues of fire rested on the head of each one of them, thus signifying that the message would be with power and authority changing the landscape of the hearts of men. God gave them power that would withstand the forces of evil, a nature that would cause men to hungry and thirst after righteousness, because man is naturally hungry for God and doesn’t know it.
Look at what was taken place in the Upper Room. The disciples were recreated when the Spirit touched their lives, tongues of fire rested upon each one of them. And the Spirit of God entered their bodies and they begin to speak the wonderful things of God.
Under the First Covenant, the Holy Spirit would come upon men for a special ministry, and then He would leave them. They did not receive the Holy Spirit, as the disciples had in the Upper Room, for they were not born again.
When Jesus died on the cross the veil was rent and opened up a new and living way. Under the Old Covenant God would visit His people within the veil. But on the Day of Pentecost the Spirit entered a new temple, a Temple not made with hands.
1 Corinthians 3:16 “Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, that the Spirit of God dwells in you? If any man defile the temple of God, him shall God destroy; for the temple of God is holy, which temple ye are.” Our body is the temple of God and together we make up the body of Christ, which is called the church.
I believe the heart of the Father was filled with joy, for in that Upper Room the Holy Spirit had given birth to that which would become the family of God. Men, who had for so long been ruled by Satan, are now ruled by the Spirit of God.
The legal side of the plan of redemption has been finished and now the vital side has been manifested. And the Holy Sprit would guide the early believers as they continued in prayer and the breaking of bread together.
The Father saw the reign of righteousness in men, where condemnation had held them bond. It was the beginning of the New Creation, a new class of people. It was the end of a sense knowledge ruled people. It was the end of the Abraham Covenant and the beginning of a New Covenant in the Spirit.
A new family leaps into being from the womb of the creator, the making of sons and daughters who would turn Jerusalem upside down with the good news of the gospel which is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believes.
The drama of the Upper Room experience was the start of the church that Jesus purchased with His own blood where men and women would do great exploits in the Kingdom of God. This was the outpouring of a new kind of love, a love that would cause men and women to love their neighbor, love the sinner but hate the sin.
What a thrilling moment that must have been, gathered in one place and in one accord waiting for the promise of the Father. Then all of a sudden a new reality in life took place. “Old things were passed and behold all things became new.”
