The Day Of Pentecost Series

The Day of Pentecost

Series: Book of Acts #9

Acts 2:1-14[1]

Intro

Show text from “The Visual Bible: Acts Volume I”

In our study of Acts, the Day of Pentecost has come. The Promise that Jesus had told His followers to prayerfully wait for has arrived.

I. notice with me the perfect Timing of the Spirit.

Pentecost was one of the three Jewish festivals in which individuals were to journey to Jerusalem and appear before the Lord at the temple with their gifts and offerings.[2] What we read about in Acts 2 occurs when the city is filled with people who will witness the outpouring of the Spirit. On that day 3000 will be saved and be filled with the Spirit and then return as witnesses throughout the Roman world. God’s timing is always perfect. Surely some of the 120 wondered why it was necessary to wait in Jerusalem. Jesus didn’t explain to them all the whys and wherefores. He simply told them what to do and they did it and it worked. Has God told you something to do without filling you in on all the whys and wherefores? “The just shall live by faith.”[3] Sometimes we have to simply trust His guidance and see what happens.

Acts 2:1 says, “When the day of Pentecost came, they were all together in one place.” We’re not told specifically whether they were still in the upper room or not. We know that at some point they are in the temple court where Peter preached his sermon. It was also their custom to attend the morning and evening prayer times at the temple.[4] So they may have been in the temple court when the Spirit was poured out or they may have been in the upper room and came out to the temple court.

The important thing is this: the day they had been waiting for came! And when it came they were ready. They were all there together in one place doing exactly what Jesus had told them to do. The times and seasons that God has designed for the world and even for our own personal lives are in His hands. He has wisely and sovereignty planned the steps of our lives.[5] Our part is to simply trust and obey. Are you doing that? If you are, good things are about to happen in your life because you serve a very good God.

Pentecost is from the Greek word meaning 50th. It is referring to the 50th day after the Passover. The Passover was sacrificed on the 14th day of the first month of the year (Abib). The third day following that sacrifice a sheaf of barley harvest was offered to God. That sheaf was the firstfruits of the harvest. When Jesus rose the third day after His crucifixion 1Cor. 15:20 tells us He was the firstfruits of the resurrection. Seven weeks later they offered God two loaves of wheat bread which represented the gathering of the final harvest.[6] That was the Day of Pentecost which was on a Sunday. Lev 23:15-17 "’From the day after the Sabbath, the day you brought the sheaf of the wave offering, count off seven full weeks. 16 Count off fifty days up to the day after the seventh Sabbath, and then present an offering of new grain to the LORD. 17 From wherever you live, bring two loaves made of two-tenths of an ephah of fine flour, baked with yeast, as a wave offering of firstfruits to the LORD.”

Why is all that important? Because the typology teaches us that Pentecost is about the harvest. Jesus established the connection in Acts 1:8 “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth." Any time the church loses sight of that connection she gets into trouble. The Holy Spirit is poured out on the Day of Pentecost for the harvest of souls. We are empowered by the Holy Spirit to be a witness. That’s the express purpose of the baptism in the Holy Spirit.

II. The Manifestation of the Spirit is described in the next few verses—three supernatural signs were given.

1st was the sound of violent wind. Acts 2:2 “Suddenly”—God can intervene at any moment He chooses. Your world can look one way at one moment and completely different the next. All you need is for God to show up in power. The walls of Jericho looked exactly the same after Israel had obediently circled them thirteen times. But when everything was in place and everything God told them to do was done—“suddenly” the walls fell. Never forget the possibility of a “suddenly” from God in your life.

“Suddenly a sound like the blowing of a violent wind came from heave and filled the whole house where they were sitting.” Understand it was not an actual wind. It was a supernatural sound—not the sound of a gentle breeze but the sound of a violent wind. (Like the roar of the stormy sea[7] or of a tornado.) People often report that a tornado sounds like a freight train. That is something like what they heard. It got people’s attention. When God wanted to get Job’s attention He did something similar. Job 38:1 says God answered Job out of a whirlwind. Elijah was taken into heaven in a whirlwind. And of course, wind is symbolic of the Holy Spirit. Jesus indicated that when He said to Nicodemus in John 3:8 “The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit."