The day of Pentecost Acts 2:1-13
How many of you read the obituaries? I always do, first, I want to make sure my name isn’t there and then I want to see if there’s anyone there I know. I read an interesting one the other day and thought I’d share it with you.
It was the Obituary of the Pillsbury Doughboy
It said, “Please join me in remembering a great icon. Veteran Pillsbury spokesperson, The Pillsbury Doughboy, died yesterday of a severe yeast infection and complications from repeated pokes to the belly. He was 71. Doughboy was buried in a slightly greased coffin. Dozens of celebrities turned out, including Mrs. Butterworth, the California Raisins, Hungry Jack, Betty Crocker, the Hostess Twinkies, Captain Crunch and many others. The graveside was piled high with flours as long-time friend, Aunt Jemima, delivered the eulogy, describing Doughboy as a man who "never knew how much he was kneaded."
Doughboy rose quickly in show business, but his later life was filled with many turnovers. He was not considered a very smart cookie, wasting most of his dough on half-baked schemes. Despite being a little flaky at times, even as a crusty old man, he was still considered a roll model for millions. Doughboy is survived by his second wife, Play Dough. They have two children and one in the oven. The funeral was held at 3:50 for about 20 minutes.”
1 And when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all with one accord in one place. 2 And suddenly there came a sound from heaven as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting. 3 And there appeared unto them cloven tongues like as of fire, and it sat upon each of them. 4 And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance.
5 And there were dwelling at Jerusalem Jews, devout men, out of every nation under heaven. 6 Now when this was noised abroad, the multitude came together, and were confounded, because that every man heard them speak in his own language. 7 And they were all amazed and marvelled, saying one to another, Behold, are not all these which speak Galileans? 8 And how hear we every man in our own tongue, wherein we were born? 9 Parthians, and Medes, and Elamites, and the dwellers in Mesopotamia, and in Judaea, and Cappadocia, in Pontus, and Asia, 10 Phrygia, and Pamphylia, in Egypt, and in the parts of Libya about Cyrene, and strangers of Rome, Jews and proselytes, 11 Cretes and Arabians, we do hear them speak in our tongues the wonderful works of God.
12 And they were all amazed, and were in doubt, saying one to another, what meaneth this? 13 Others mocking said, these men are full of new wine.
In chapter 1 the disciples were told to wait for the Holy Spirit and in chapter 2 we see the Holy Spirit’s arrival. In chapter 1 they were told to wait but in chapter 2 they were told to go. And in chapter 1 they were all gathered together in the upper room but in chapter two they go out into the streets and addressed the people who came because of the obvious loud and unusual sound.
So, there are changes taking place and that’s what the book of Acts is all about because the Jewish style of synagogue worship gives way to the Christian church and throughout the book of Acts we’ll see things develop as change takes place and we’ll see believers taking a stand for the things they know to be true, churches being born in difficult situations and people like Stephan giving their lives for the faith.
Acts is both historical in that it describes what happened but it’s also an accurate account of the church in transition as the church goes from a small group of Jews who were gathered in the upper room to several thousand in Jerusalem to millions throughout the world.
In this book we’ll also see several miracles taking place and some assume this to be the norm for the church but if it was normal then they wouldn’t be called miracles. Miracles are things that only God can do and these are things that go beyond the natural laws. Someone defined miracles as an unusual work of God where He arouses our sense of awe and wonder and bears witness to Himself. I’ve heard people say, “We need to see more miracles; but if we did they wouldn’t be called miracles; would they?
Someone might say, "I had a financial need and the mailman brought a check for exactly the same amount I needed and that was a miracle." Or, someone says, "I went to the mall and found a parking place right by the front door of the store I wanted to shop in” and they considered that to be a miracle too. Or, maybe you were thinking and praying for somebody and all of a sudden your phone rings and it was the very one you were thinking of and you say, "That was a miracle!"
Listen, when God meets your needs or you find a place to park or someone calls you’ve been praying for; we call these things acts of providence where God is simply orchestrating natural events without suspending the natural, but He’s controlling the natural so that it does what He wants it to do.
But, a miracle is a supernatural event that has no human explanation and more than that, a miracle is also supernatural event which suspends natural law and it cannot be explained by natural means.
I’ve heard people say, I’d like to experience a real miracle. Well, would you like to be healed? Then you’re going to have to get so sick the doctors can’t help. Would you like God to provide your needs? Then you could end up like the widow who only had enough food to last for one day. Or if you’d like to be raised from the dead then, you’re going to have to die. The problem is; most of us would rather be the one doing the miracles than having them done for us. I think, we’re better off being thankful for what we have then for asking for things we either don’t need or don’t want to need.
Most Biblical miracles happened in one of three brief periods of Biblical history.
1. The days of Moses and Joshua.
2. During the ministries of Elijah and Elisha.
3. In the time of Jesus Christ and then His apostles.
None of these time periods lasted much more than a hundred years and during these three times, the miracles involved just Moses and Joshua, Elijah and Elisha and Jesus and His apostles. Others have benefited from the miracles but nobody else was performing miracles.
Do you remember the story of Simon in Acts 8 where he tried to pay Peter to give him the ability to perform miracles but Peter rebuked him? Why was he trying to buy this power? Because; only the apostles had these gifts.
So, all three of these periods of miracles were times when God authenticated His messengers and gave His written revelation. Moses and Joshua during the time of the giving of the Law; Elijah and Elisha introduced the prophetic office, the prophetic age, and all of the books of prophecies such as the Major and Minor Prophets and then Jesus and His apostles introduced the era of New Testament revelation.
And aside from those three times the only other miracles recorded in Scripture were very, isolated ones like in the days of Isaiah where the Lord miraculously defeated Sennacherib's army or when He healed Hezekiah and turned the sun's shadow back or in Daniel, when He delivered Shadrach, Meshach and Abed-nego from the fiery furnace, Daniel from the lion’s den and then saved Jonah from the belly of a fish but these were very uncommon and they happened over the span of hundreds if not thousands of years.
As we come to this section of scripture I want to divide it into three sections so it’s easier to understand.
I The Pentecostal experience
II How God brought a crowd together
III And then the two responses to the miracles and we’ll see that some were shocked and some just mocked.
Luke sets the scene for Pentecost but he begins by explaining that this wasn’t something brought on by the apostles but this Pentecostal experience was a sovereign act of God.
First, we see this Pentecostal experience
And the first thing I want you to see is when it took place because it says, ‘when the day of Pentecost was come’ and I’d like to define what the day of Pentecost is because there’s been so much misuse of this term that people seem to think this was the beginning of the Pentecostal church but the actual historical Pentecostal Church began in Los Angeles, California in 1906 and the original church only lasted until 1915. It was led by an African American preacher by the name of William J. Seymour.
And this revival as it was called was characterized by ecstatic spiritual experiences and was accompanied by miracles, dramatic worship services, speaking in tongues and inter-racial mingling which meant blacks and whites worshipped together which was very unusual for the time.
The people involved in these meetings were criticized by both the secular media and Christian theologians for behaviors they considered to be outrageous and unorthodox. This revival is considered to be the primary catalyst for the spread of Pentecostalism in the 20th century.
Now; let’s get to the real Pentecost and let me begin by describing the seven annual feasts the Jews held, so, you’ll understand the significance of what happened.
The first feast was the Passover and this was also known as the feast of redemption and this feast reflected Israel’s deliverance from their bondage in Egypt.
The next was the Feast of Unleavened Bread and this one lasted for seven days. Its chief characteristic was for everyone to get rid of any leaven in their houses because leaven represented sin. So, this feast was supposed to signify a time of cleansing.
I had a Jewish friend in Toronto who told me that before this feast his mother would throw bits of yeast under the beds and then she’d go around the house and make sure all of it was cleaned up again.
There are at least five kinds of leaven were mentioned in the New Testament. The first is where Jesus warned His disciples to beware of the leaven of the Pharisees which He identified as self-righteousness and hypocrisy. Then there is the leaven of the Sadducees which is unbelief and the leaven of Herod which is worldliness. And then Paul spoke of the leaven of the Corinthians which was immorality and the leaven of the Galatians which was legalism. Leaven’s function is to puff things up and this reminds us of pride which is the beginning of all sin.
The third in order of the annual festivals was the feast of first fruits and there was no set date for this one since it happened whenever the grain was ripe and the time for harvest arrived. A chosen committee was sent from the temple to gather a small amount of grain which they’d thresh and grind into to flour and then they’d present it before the Lord. And by this; they were acknowledging both the power and the goodness of God.
The fourth feast was called the feast of Weeks or Pentecost and it came fifty days after the Passover; from which we get the name Pentecost. Pente means five or fifty. Pentecost was celebrated in June which was the best time for travelling which also explains the large number of people from different countries who were gathered in Jerusalem. In total they assumed there were around two million people from the various countries.
Pentecost was also called the Feast of Weeks and during the Old Testament era it was originally an agricultural festival which involved celebrating and the giving thanks for the "first fruits" of the early spring harvest and during this ceremony they offered two loaves of bread in appreciation for the harvest and also commemorated the giving of the law on Mount Sinai. No work was to be done and this was considered a national holiday.
Then fifth was the feast of trumpets. In Leviticus 23:4 the Jews were told, ‘Speak unto the children of Israel, saying, ‘In the seventh month, in the first day of the month, shall ye have a Sabbath, a memorial of blowing of trumpets, an holy convocation.’
The trumpet was the signal for the workers to come from the field and worship and we can also see a prophetic picture of the church coming from the fields of the world to worship in heaven.
Then sixth, is the feast of atonement which provides a time of confession of sin. In Leviticus 23:27-28 it says, ‘Also on the tenth day of this seventh month there shall be a day of atonement: it shall be an holy convocation unto you; and ye shall afflict your souls, and offer an offering made by fire unto the LORD. And ye shall do no work in that same day: for it is a day of atonement, to make an atonement for you before the LORD your God.’
And today the church celebrates the ‘day of atonement’ every day because we know Jesus paid or made atonement for our sins.
And then the seventh feast is the feast of tabernacles where the Jews build little huts of straw or booths and these huts were all over the city and were meant to remind them of how God had protected them during their time in the wilderness.
So, we see the time of year was Pentecost or early June and the disciples were gathered in the upper room and it doesn’t say what they were doing but verse 2 says, ‘And suddenly there came a sound from heaven as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting. And there appeared unto them cloven tongues like as of fire, and it sat upon each of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance.’
In verse 2 the word ‘suddenly’ introduces an element of surprise because no one was expecting anything, praying for anything or even hoping for anything like this. They were told the Holy Spirit was coming but no one knew what to expect. And we could say the same is true of the rapture; we know it’s going to happen, we have signs that raise our sense of expectation and we have a sense of hopefulness but Jesus says His return is going to be like a thief in the night. So, the experience of the Holy Spirit’s coming was both prophesied and yet it was totally unexpected.
This initial arrival of the Holy Spirit was both audible which means they could hear it and it was also visual. It says the sound was ‘as of or like’ a mighty rushing wind. So, it wasn’t a mighty rushing wind but was ‘like’ one and it says it filled ‘all’ the house. And then it says the tongues of fire were as of or like fire.
So, we don’t know if they felt or only heard the wind or if there was any heat from the tongues of fire because Luke was using things to describe things he couldn’t understand and we see the same thing happening with Elijah when he looked into heaven and John when he tried to describe the visions he had in the book of Revelation. And what these writers are doing is trying to describe are things they’ve never seen before to people who have no idea what they’re describing.
Listen, the supernatural activity of God is so far beyond our ability to describe that the Biblical writers use any means they can to describe the things they saw.
And you’ve got to understand this was such a fantastic noise that thousands of people came running to find out what was going on.
And what happens here is; this group of believers became the very foundation of the church because as the Spirit rested on them they became the body of Christ and everyone who became part of the body were baptized into the body by the Holy Spirit.
Now, being baptized by the Spirit is different than being filled with the Spirit because the baptism of the Holy Spirit happens when we’re born again but the filling is a continuous experience.
For instance, these men were baptized in the Spirit here but in Acts 4:31 it says they were filled again. Speaking of Peter and John it says, ‘And when they had prayed, the place was shaken where they were assembled together; and they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and they spake the word of God with boldness.’ Acts 6:5 describes Stephen as a man full of faith and the Holy Spirit and yet Acts 7:55 describes him being filled again and the same is true of Paul in Acts 9:17 and Acts 13:9.
All of us are baptised in the Spirit at salvation but Ephesians 5:18 commands us to be continually filled with the Spirit. So, baptism happens when we’re saved but filling is a response of our willingness to be controlled or influenced by the Holy Spirit. One writer said, ‘The baptism of the Spirit provides the power that the filling of the Spirit expresses.’
And one of the results is that they began to speak with other tongues or languages and this gift of tongues or the ability to speak in other languages came on three other groups besides these Jews in Acts 2. There were gentiles at the house of Cornelius in Acts 10, the disciples of John in Ephesus in Acts 19 who were also Jews and it’s also possible that this gift was given to the Samaritans in Acts 8:18. And each time it happened to a different group so that no one would ever feel they were inferior to the rest.
Paul explains in 1 Corinthians 14:22 that "tongues" were a sign to unbelievers and were not to be exercised unless there was someone present who understood the language and could translate. But if you were to attend a charismatic fellowship today you’ll hear everybody speaking in tongues and nobody is interpreting.
The tongues being practised today is a rather recent phenomenon in Christianity and it came about in four waves. The 1st wave began as I said around 1901. The 2nd wave was the Charismatic movement which began in the early 1960’s in Van Nuys, California, under Dennis Bennett who was the Rector of an Episcopalian Church and this spread to all major churches reaching a total of 55 million people by 1990 and it included Baptists, Methodists, Presbyterians, Lutherans, Roman Catholics and many others.
I remember hearing Dennis Bennett and his wife in Vancouver back in 69 or 70 and he make a statement that really woke me up when he said, ‘We can argue about what the Bible teaches till the end of the world but let’s put our Bibles aside and I’ll tell you about my experience.’
The 3rd wave was the Catholic Charismatic Renewal movement which started in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania in 1967 and by 1993 it had touched the lives of over 100 million Catholics in over 238 nations.
And then the 4th wave started in 1981 at Fuller Theological Seminary with John Wimber and by 1990 they figure there were 33 million who were involved in the signs and wonders movement although they played down labels such as “Pentecostal” and “Charismatic”.
And you have to remember that the gift of tongues doesn’t prove anything because this gift is something that’s practiced among unbelieving groups such as some Eskimo cults, in Japanese séances, by the shamans in Ethiopia and various spirits in Haitian Voodoo and African tribal religions.
Let me just share a little of my involvement with the charismatic movement. When I was saved the man who led me to the Lord had been a Salvation Army warrant officer which would be in our circles equivalent to a volunteer youth pastor. And he was very committed to three things; first, he studied and memorized the scripture constantly. Second, he also studied the Salvation Army handbook and this book covered most areas of a soldier’s life like how they should be disciplined in their practical life, exhibit holiness in all areas and be soul winners. And then third, he read a lot of material that was available on the charismatic movement and he encouraged everyone else to do the same.
So, to a certain degree the commune I was involved in was charismatic but also very Biblically evangelistic. And this led me to asking a lot of questions because I wanted God’s best but at the same time I didn’t see too much reality in the charismatic movement.
And back then my friends and I would go and hear all kinds of speakers and healers like Benny Hinn who was just starting out and he very impressive speaker but he also seemed insensitive to those who had real problems.
I remember one night an older man and woman came forward during the call for those who needed prayer and the man was crying and told Benny that his wife had just been diagnosed with terminal cancer. Benny laid hands on her head; said she was healed and walked away. And I thought; not only was she not healed but he didn’t seem to care. It was like there was nothing there for him and he left.
Another night we went down to Evangel Temple and they had a guest preacher there for a week of meetings and this man was extremely effeminate and dressed in a light purple suit. He began by asking the congregation to pray for his poodles because he had to leave them sick in his suite at the Royal York Hotel.
Anyway, he preached to a full house and my two friends and I were sitting in the balcony agreeing that this was the biggest phoney we had ever seen but when he gave the altar call for healing one of my friends who had been mocking him got up and went forward. And when he came back I asked him what had happened and he said, ‘I don’t care if he is a phony I got my healing anyway.’
And I wondered; if he was healed then who healed him? Did God use the phony preacher? Did the devil do it? Or did he even get healed? Personally, I don’t think anything happened.
So, this gift of tongues was a miraculous, revelatory gift and it ended with the ministry of the apostles. The last recorded miracles in the New Testament happened somewhere around A.D. 58 and since the book of Revelation wasn’t written until A.D. 96 we have almost 40 years with no sign gifts taking place. Miracle gifts like tongues and healings are mentioned only in 1 Corinthians, which is a very early epistle. Two later epistles, Ephesians and Romans discuss spiritual gifts but only mention the sign gifts.
So, these supernatural signs had their effect but what amazed the people most was; the men who were speaking in these languages were all Galileans who spoke what was considered to be a rude Aramaic and probably had their own way of butchering the Greek language as well. They were considered to be ignorant and uneducated and even if one of them could speak a language other than their own; no one would expect any of them to be fluent in sixteen different languages.
Remember when Philip told Nathanael that he had found the Messiah, Jesus of Nazareth and Philip responds by saying, ‘Can anything good come out of Nazareth?’ You see Nazareth was part of Galilee. And then when Nicodemas tried to defend Jesus to the other religious leaders he was met with an attitude of ridicule when they said, ‘You are not also from Galilee, are you? Search and see that no prophet arises out of Galilee.’
I remember when I was a kid living in Cape Breton; we lived on Bridgeport rows which was only about a half a mile from the ocean and every once in a while a tourist from somewhere or another would drive through the neighbourhood to see the shore. One day a man had gone down and on his way up the shore road his brand new car stopped and he couldn’t get it started again.
I was only about eleven or twelve and I walked over and asked him what the problem was and he said he didn’t know and then he asked where he could find a garage but I told him there were around and then he asked where he could find a phone but there were also very few of those as well.
So, I said, I know a man who can fix anything. Do you want me to go get him? He said sure and I went a few doors up and brought Howard MacDonald down and I say I brought him down because Howard was blind and this guy seemed reluctant to have a blind man work on his brand new car.
Well, Howard felt his way around the motor, took off the air filter and removed some dirt from the gas filter by blowing through it and put it all back together and said, ‘Try it.’ The car started right up and even though the man tried to pay him Howard wouldn’t hear of it. He was just glad to be able to do it. Imagine that, not only a dumb Cape Bretoner but a blind one fixing his car.
I’m sure that’s what these guys were thinking when they heard all these Galileans praising and glorifying God by speaking of His mighty deeds in their languages.
So, God used sound of the wind to draw these men near and then the various languages to get them to listen and they began arguing among themselves about what was going on and one part of the group were amazed, while another wanted to understand what was going on and a third part just began making fun of what they didn’t understand.
I guess it’s like what Winston Churchill once said, ‘Men stumble over the truth from time to time, but most pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing happened.’
Their reactions are the same reactions people have when they hear the gospel today. Some respond positively and get saved. Some are upset and say the gospel is something private and personal and no one should be imposing their beliefs on others. And some make mock because their best defence is to make fun of anything they don’t understand. But; look at the results, 3000 were saved in one day.
Someone said, “It’s a shame that the term Pentecostal Power is more associated with speaking in tongues than with world evangelization because the message of Pentecost was evangelism.”
So the scripture tells us the gift of tongues of the first century had two purposes; first it affirmed the authority of the apostles and second, it was identified as a sign to unbelieving Israel.
This gift also indicated that God had begun a new work which included the Gentiles and as soon as that message was clear to Israel, it wasn’t necessary to keep repeating it. And before the first century ended, the New Testament was written and these revelatory gifts had ceased to have any purpose and faded from the scene.
II God brought a crowd together
And then verse 4 says, ‘they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance.’ So, these men were empowered by the Holy Spirit and this was neither an act of will nor any learned behaviour. And if you look again in verse 6 you’ll see where it says, ‘Now when this was noised abroad, the multitude came together, and were confounded, because that every man heard them speak in his own language.” Some of these were probably devout Jews who had come from distant lands to Jerusalem to observe the Feast of Pentecost and when they heard these local people speaking languages their native languages which they knew they didn’t know they were shocked. And you’ve got to understand that they were speaking actual languages like French, English, German, Spanish and Chinese. This was not some kind of a strange spiritual experience but God was actually using them to communicate to those who were around them.
And this very dramatic demonstration took place in the middle of Jerusalem and was witnessed by thousands of people and it says that three thousand were saved according to verse 41. So, this wasn’t just the disciples and a few people gathered outside the door for some kind of street meeting but there were thousands.
Imagine; if God gave the same gift today; foreign missions would be a snap. People could just walk up to someone and start witnessing but that’s not happening because the tongues that were spoken back then were only given for a brief period of time and for specific purposes but the tongues that are spoken today are not the tongues of the New Testament.
So, this wasn’t gibberish and it wasn’t as some people claim to be a tongue of angels. After all, the angels spoke in Hebrew to Abraham, Lot, Joshua, Daniel, Manoah and John when he was on the island of Patmos, Peter when he was in prison and Paul when he went through the shipwreck but that doesn’t mean God can’t enable them to speak to anyone.
When I Corinthians 13 refers to tongues of angels I think it’s clearly referring to a quality of voice and it’s also a voice that’s not been affected by sin.
Then there are those today who say the gift of tongues is a special prayer language but listen, what kind of prayer would you really be praying if you didn’t know what you’re saying? I mean, if you’re speaking in a language you don’t understand then how would you know if you were praising or even cursing God? And if you didn’t know what you were asking, then how you would know if He answered?
When Jesus taught the disciples to pray in Matthew 6 the prayer was very specific. It dealt with worship, it acknowledged who God is and His right to rule, it dealt with petitions and provisions, it dealt with forgiveness both giving and receiving and it dealt with sin and temptation. In other words, Jesus prayer made sense.
So, if someone is speaking in a tongue; do we assume that God is speaking through them because if we do then we should write it down and paste it in our Bibles and if we don’t do that then we can conclude that God is giving us substandard revelation. And what it all comes done to is, the gift of tongues outside the Bible’s teaching doesn’t make sense.
III The reaction of the crowds.
Some were amazed and they were amazed at God’s ability and not what these men were doing. Some were worried because they had never seen this happen before and they were afraid. And some mocked and wrote the whole thing off by saying these guys are drunk. But when you think about it, that was a strange thing to say, because people never act more intelligent drunk then they do sober. They may think they do, but they don’t.
Conclusion
So, what happened when the Holy Spirit came? The church was born when we talk about the church we see it in three stages; first there’s the local church and some local churches have lasted for a thousand years while others only served their current generation.
I remember a missionary told me he came from a small church in the country that only had thirty-five people and from this church God called eleven people into full-time ministry. The church supported them and as time went by the people of the area died off and the church folded.
So, there are local churches and there is the worldwide church that consists of all believers of races. And then third, there’s the universal church which consists of all believers throughout the ages from Pentecost to the rapture.
So, we’ve seen the beginning of the church and God never gives us the impression that if we simply repeat the same steps they took; so we can have the same experience. Pentecost was all God’s doing and as we’ll see throughout the Book of Acts, God is sovereign and He sovereignly bestows His spiritual gifts on whomever He wills to accomplish His purposes.
