1. Personal illustration of time when I experienced power of Holy Spirit to enable me in my ministry.
2. This experience helps me get some idea of what happened that powerful and wonderful day in Jerusalem nearly 2,000 years ago when the Holy Spirit came down - day of Pentecost
3. Not comparing my experience to Pentecost, but we can experience the HS in ways they did.
4. I believe that we all seek to esperience the presence of God the Holy Spirit in our lives. To see God at work in us. Today we will see how we can and do also experience the events of Pentecost Day.
Teaching
1. First we consider what actually happened on this day.
1. Disciples given their work before Jesus returned to heaven - to be witness in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria and to the ends of the earth.
2. They joined together constantly in prayer, they waited for the Holy Spirit - when He came it was sudden and the events must have surprised them.
3. The Holy Spirit’s came upon them.
a. The sound of a mighty rushing wind came from heaven and filled the house in which they were sitting.
i. Wind represented the Spirit of God. Ezekiel was told to call the wind to blow upon dead bodies and dry bones in the valley which he saw in a vision. (Ez. 37)
ii. The wind was the presence of the HS in a powerful way, as a source of life and not in a way that simply passed through the house but stayed in it and filled it.
b. What appeared to be tongues of fire which separated and rested upon each of them.
i. Reminds us of how God appeared to Moses in a burning bush.
4. We also at times, though not as powerfully, experience the presence of the Holy Spirit as we worship together.
a. To my surprise, I believe that sometimes when I felt more spiritually prepared, the sense of the HS’s presence did not seem as great to me as at other times/
i.We cannot force the Spirit to make Himself present in a powerful way. (John 3:8). The Holy Spirit sometimes comes in powerful ways but He can also come as a quiet comforter -1Kgs 19:12 - a gentle whisper.
5. After describing the events that occurred, Luke tells us what these outward signs represent.
a. The disciples both baptized with HS and filled with HS.
i. When John the Baptist was baptizing his disciples with water he told them that Jesus would baptize with the HS. Just 10 days before, Jesus told them "Do not leave Jerusalem, but wait for the gift my Father promised, which you have heard me speak about. For John baptized with water, but in a few days you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit."
ii. After Pentecost, all believers are baptized with HS when they receive Jesus Christ as their Lord and Saviour . (1Cor 12:13)
b. The disciples were also filled with the HS - not a one-time experience but one that can reoccur in us. My experience was filled with the HS but not the only time.
i. May seem that we are filled only when there is a dramatic event such as the one in Acts 2, but that is not necessary.
ii. While we should seek to be continually full of the Spirit, we should look for special fillings of the HS in special circumstances.
iii. To be filled with the Spirit means to be equipped with power for a particular service to which God has called us, not a service in which we can take personal glory, but one to be used for building up the kingdom and is be used by the church.
iv. In book if Acts, we read of a church and its members who were often filled to carry out the mission of the church.
6. As a result of being baptized and filled with the HS, there was a strong witness of the power of the HS and the work of God.
a. Began to speak in other tongues, as the Spirit enabled them to.
i. Received gift of tongues but they received more than that.
ii. This is the only place in the Bible were the word OTHER is placed with tongues.
iii. Gift of speaking in tongues refers to an unintelligible language which other people cannot understand. Used as a
private prayer language or it is used in the body of believers when it can be interpreted by one who has the gift of interpretation.
iv. Here special anointing of other tongues for Jews who were present but spoke other languages.
b. Peter, who had earlier been afraid to confess Jesus, now stood before the people and preached boldly, telling them to believe and be saved. 3,000 people were saved on that single day.
7. The Holy Spirit worked in a mighty way both in the lives of the disciples and in the hearts of those who received their message.
8. Jesus had said that they would receive power when the HS came upon them. His words were true.
a. Power was primarily not to build up their own faith and to make them feel comfortable in their faith but to move them to do the work that Jesus had called them to do.
i. To be His witnesses to the ends of the earth.
9. We are their spiritual heirs, we are disciples and so the call to be witnesses is to each one of us here this morning and to us as a church
10. Story of Acts is one of witness and it began on Pentecost and continues today.
11. We all have the HS dwelling within us. Have you experienced and felt the presence of the HS in you?
a. In a powerful or perhaps in a quieter way?
b. Do you want God to fill you with the Holy Spirit?
c. God has specific tasks for us as a church and as individuals . Are you committed to God and to the work He has set before us.
12. If you are, we can be filled with Holy Spirit, as God wills. As said, we cannot force, but we see from the disciples that there are things we can do which the disciples did. And as my experiences have show, then we too can be filled. What are these things we can do?
13. We need to be preoccupied. With what.
a. The presence of the risen Lord! Lives changed by experiencing Christ (Acts 1:8). We can by meditating on word and His promises. To be with us and to rule over us.
b. A purpose. Acts 1:8. As said, God empowers us for a task. If we live to obey Christ and to bring His gift of salvation to others, He will send HS to do the work.
c. Prayer. Acts 1:14. The disciples prayed for ten days. They were constantly in prayer. If we would do the same, what would happen to us.
14. As individuals, as a church, we too can be filled. Not necessarily speak in tongues or experience a mighty wind, but we will know that something has changed us. We will experience our own Pentecost. We will experience revival and God’s working through us.
