THE UPPER ROOM IN THREE ACTS
John 13; 20; Acts 2
INTRODUCTION
A. HUMOR: THE BOARD MEETING
1. Announcement: “There will be a meeting of the Church Board immediately after the service in the cafeteria,” announced the pastor.
2. After the service, the Church Board gathered, but a stranger joined them — a visitor who’d attended for his first time.
3. “Friend,” said the pastor, “Didn’t you understand that this is a meeting of the Board?”
“Yes, Sir” said the visitor, “after today’s sermon, I supposed I should try to figure out, how NOT to be bored!”
B. TWO GREAT UPPER ROOMS
1. Charles Templeton once said that the history of the world was altered by the events which took place in two upper rooms. They were separated by some three thousand miles and nearly two thousand years.
2. One was a flat over a laundry in the Soho slum district of London. It had a dirty, curtainless window, and it contained a small, round table stacked high with papers. By the light of a flickering oil lamp a bearded man sat writing with a cheap, scratchy pen. He was Karl Marx, a Jew, and he was writing “Das Kapital” the Bible of modern Communism. Today, nearly a third of the world’s population follows his economic theory, and most live in slavery as bad as that against which they rebelled.
3. The second upper room was spacious and was located in one of the world’s oldest cities, Jerusalem. This room was mysteriously revealed to the disciples by a miracle of divine appointment.
C. DISCOVERY OF THE UPPER ROOM
1. In Mark 14:12-14 Jesus gave directions for finding this room; “On the first day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread, when it was customary to sacrifice the Passover lamb, Jesus' disciples asked him, "Where do you want us to go and make preparations for you to eat the Passover?" So he sent two of his disciples, telling them, "Go into the city, and a man carrying a jar of water will meet you. Follow him. Say to the owner of the house he enters, 'The Teacher asks: Where is my guest room, where I may eat the Passover with my disciples?'”
2. The disciples had to walk to the city at their own random pace from somewhere outside it, and walk around the city until they saw a man carrying a jar of water. Simultaneously, the water-bearer would leave the residence he served in and head for a well, stand in line to get water, fill his jar, and head back for the residence, stopping to greet those he knew along the route. How he and the two disciples would end up converging is a mystery of how God can manipulate random events! Of the hundreds of water carriers in Jerusalem, only this one would lead them back to the upper room.
3. This upper room became the focal point of several significant events in N.T. history. Let’s look into the 3 times this room was significant to spiritual revelation.
I. ACT I — JESUS’ LAST SUPPER (John 13)
A. FOOT WASHING: HUMILITY
1. Jesus told his men, clearly and matter-of-factly, “Next time this happens. . . wash one another’s feet.” I believe he meant it literally. Years later, Peter himself—who at first had tried to refuse Jesus’ servant ministry to him—wrote a letter to the church throughout Asia Minor and told them, in a pointed reference to Jesus’ act wrapping the apron of humility around himself before washing Peter’s feet, “Clothe yourselves with humility toward one another.”
2. I think it’s as simple as that. The “manifest meaning” of Jesus words is that he intended, literally, for them to wash each other’s feet the next time they were in such a situation. But that’s not all. I believe that his deed and words also meant a call...
B. TO SERVANTHOOD TO ALL
1. When Jesus spoke the words of verses 14 & 15, he did not mean only that his followers should literally wash each other’s feet; he also meant it figuratively. In the words of Mark 9:35, “If anyone wants to be first, he must be the very last, and the servant of all.”
2. An 18-year-old boy from a wealthy Chinese family came to the China Inland Mission for training in medicine. Elegant and educated, Hsu Chu was a model of Chinese nobility. A few days after he had begun training, the superintendent was called to deal with him. He had been asked to clean some shoes, and indignantly refused, saying he was a gentleman and a scholar and wouldn’t do such menial work.
The wise superintendent took the shoes and cleaned them herself, while Hsu Chu looked on. Then, leading the young man to her office, she asked him to read for her from John’s Gospel, the portion that is our text today.
Upon reading those verses of Scripture, his face flushed, and his eyes filled with tears. He laid the Bible down and said, “May Jesus forgive me.”
From that day, no one scrubbed floors, cleaned shoes, or performed any other humble tasks more joyfully than that young man.
“...Now that I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also should wash one another’s feet.”
3. It also means FORGIVING one another.
II. ACT II — TRAGEDY TO TRIUMPH John 20:19-20, 24
A. THE HIDEOUT IN FEAR, DEPRESSION
1. Following Jesus arrest, trial, and crucifixion, the disciples gathered again in the upper room. They had heavy hearts. The past three days had been unbelievably tragic. Their hope had died with the Master. The dream of the kingdom now appeared impossible.
2. Ten disciples huddled there in fear. The door was barred. Thomas was absent and Judas had committed suicide by hanging. The men spoke in hushed tones. They were Jesus’ closest friends and followers. He had been executed by the authorities, and they might be next.
3. In one of his books, Charles Allen tells about a highway that was being built in England. In the way stood a very, very old building. The workmen tore it down and cleared off the ground on which it stood. After the ground had been exposed to the sunshine and rain for some months, a wonderful thing happened. Flowers began to spring up, and botanists and naturalists from all over England came to study them. Many of the flowers were identified as plants the Romans had brought to England almost 2,000 years before. Some of the plants that sprang up are completely unknown today. Hidden there in the ground, without air and light, the seeds seemed to have died. But they were not dead. As soon as the obstacles were cleared away, and the sunshine let in, they sprang into the fullness of their beauty. This is what can happen in the confines of our Upper Room. What was ugly and hard is some how transformed into life.
B. HOLY HALL OF RESURRECTION
1. Suddenly they were aware of another in the midst, and they became more frightened than before. Then this figure spoke in a familiar voice, “Peace be unto you.”
2. He showed them his pierced hands and side and they knew it was Jesus. And this remarkable appearance took place in the same upper room where they had eaten with the Master.
3. So the upper room became the Laboratory of the Resurrection! Here the disciple’s faith was renewed, the greatest revelation of their lives was grasped, and Jesus taught them many more lessons which they held dear till their final days.
III. ACT III — WHERE THE POWER CAME Acts 1:13; 2:1-4
A. THE FORTY DAYS
1. The risen Christ continued to appear to those who loved him: again on the next Sunday in the upper room, this time with Thomas present. He appeared to the disciples and to several hundred people in Galilee. Then after forty days he ascended to Heaven.
2. Jesus promised that if he went away the Holy Spirit would come. Thus, the early church met for prayer in the same upper room (Acts 1:14).
B. THE DAY OF PENTECOST
1. On the Day of Pentecost the upper room became the location of the fulfillment of the promises of the ages. Many prophets had foretold a future day when God would finally release His Spirit into the world to all the children of God, the heirs of salvation.
2. At last the appointed hour arrived. The heavens were torn and God came down. Acts 2:1-4 records, “When the day of Pentecost came, they were all together in one place. Suddenly a sound like the blowing of a violent wind came from heaven and filled the whole house where they were sitting. They saw what seemed to be tongues of fire that separated and came to rest on each of them. All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit enabled them.”
3. So the great revival that was foreordained to ultimately sweep the world began in that same upper room where so much divine history had already taken place. An amazing fact is that we don’t even know who the upper room belonged to, but whoever it was, they, along with the donkey owner which Jesus rode into Jerusalem, will have a great reward for the consequences of their giving to the Lord.
CONCLUSION
A. ILLUSTRATION
1. During the time of the Second Great Awakening in America, Charles Finney was the foremost among the great evangelists. Many people know HIM; however, few know the name, Daniel Nash.
2. Nash was a lackluster pastor in upper New York State who, at the age of 48, dedicated his life to prayer. Long before Finney would arrive in a town Nash would be there in an empty cellar or boarding house room praying for the power of God to enter the city. Finney relates:
3. “When I got to a town to start a revival, a lady contacted me who ran a boarding house. She said, ‘Brother Finney, do you know a Father Nash? He and two other men have been at my boardinghouse for the last three days, but they haven’t eaten a bite of food. I opened the door and peeped in at them because I could hear them groaning, and I saw them down on their faces. They have been this way for three days, lying prostrate on the floor and groaning. I thought something awful must have happened to them. I was afraid to go in and I didn’t know what to do. Would you please come see about them?’”
4. “No, it isn’t necessary,” I replied. “They just have a spirit of travail in prayer.”
5. Within four months of Nash’s death, Finney left evangelism for the pastorate. The great prayer warrior of his crusades was gone.
6. WHAT WE NEED TODAY ARE SOME DANIEL NASHS! PEOPLE WHO WILL INTERCEDE AND
USHER IN REVIVAL. WILL YOU ANSWER THE CALL TONIGHT?
B. ALTAR CALL
1. Let’s come to the Altar and seek God for:
a. Humility & Servanthood
b. Fresh Revelation of Jesus’ Resurrection
c. A New Infilling of His Holy Spirit!
2. Prayer
[This is a rewrite of Ed Wood’s great message of the same title.]
