Three Verbs - heard, saw, spoke
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The Tower of Babel
1 Now the whole world had one language and a common speech. 2 As people moved eastward, they found a plain in Shinar and settled there.
3 They said to each other, “Come, let’s make bricks and bake them thoroughly.” They used brick instead of stone, and tar for mortar. 4 Then they said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city, with a tower that reaches to the heavens, so that we may make a name for ourselves; otherwise we will be scattered over the face of the whole earth.”
5 But the Lord came down to see the city and the tower the people were building. 6 The Lord said, “If as one people speaking the same language they have begun to do this, then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them. 7 Come, let us go down and confuse their language so they will not understand each other.”
8 So the Lord scattered them from there over all the earth, and they stopped building the city. 9 That is why it was called Babel—because there the Lord confused the language of the whole world. From there the Lord scattered them over the face of the whole earth.
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The Holy Spirit Comes at Pentecost
1 When the day of Pentecost came, they were all together in one place. 2 Suddenly a sound like the blowing of a violent wind came from heaven and filled the whole house where they were sitting. 3 They saw what seemed to be tongues of fire that separated and came to rest on each of them. 4 All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit enabled them.
5 Now there were staying in Jerusalem God-fearing Jews from every nation under heaven. 6 When they heard this sound, a crowd came together in bewilderment, because each one heard their own language being spoken. 7 Utterly amazed, they asked: “Aren’t all these who are speaking Galileans? 8 Then how is it that each of us hears them in our native language? 9 Parthians, Medes and Elamites; residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, 10 Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya near Cyrene; visitors from Rome 11 (both Jews and converts to Judaism); Cretans and Arabs—we hear them declaring the wonders of God in our own tongues!” 12 Amazed and perplexed, they asked one another, “What does this mean?”
13 Some, however, made fun of them and said, “They have had too much wine.”
Peter Addresses the Crowd
14 Then Peter stood up with the Eleven, raised his voice and addressed the crowd: “Fellow Jews and all of you who live in Jerusalem, let me explain this to you; listen carefully to what I say. 15 These people are not drunk, as you suppose. It’s only nine in the morning! 16 No, this is what was spoken by the prophet Joel:
17 “‘In the last days, God says,
I will pour out my Spirit on all people.
Your sons and daughters will prophesy,
your young men will see visions,
your old men will dream dreams.
18 Even on my servants, both men and women,
I will pour out my Spirit in those days,
and they will prophesy.
19 I will show wonders in the heavens above
and signs on the earth below,
blood and fire and billows of smoke.
20 The sun will be turned to darkness
and the moon to blood
before the coming of the great and glorious day of the Lord.
21 And everyone who calls
on the name of the Lord will be saved.’ -
I recall a personal experience of being overcome in an FGBMFI service in Belfast when I was a teenager and speaking in tongues in a meeting when I was a teenager.
What happened when the Holy Spirit came on the disciples in that upper room was an overflow. They could not hold it in. They were given a language so that people visiting Jerusalem from all over Asia heard the message of Jesus and understood the good news in their own language and dialect. The disciples spoke out as the Spirit gave them utterance. It was a language they had not learnt; it was given to them. A main message from this sermon today is not to hold back from the overflow. To be filled with the Holy Spirit is not to be brim-full to the top; it is to be overflowing. From that overflow, you will splash over and influence and support your friends, relatives and acquaintances; wherever the Lord has placed you, you will affect those around you.
The Big question is this: Was this just a date in the Church calendar, i.e. Church history, or is this for today?
Pentecost is one of the three big festivals in the Church calendar, the others being Easter and Christmas.
The story in Acts Chapter 2 says, "They were all together" and Acts1:13 tells us who was present, the disciples and the women and Mary Jesus' mother and Jesus' brothers. Jesus had ascended on high ten days before this.
They had been told to go and wait in an upper room; there were about 120 people there.
Note the number 50. It's 50 days since the Resurrection;
They have been told to “Go and Wait”, and they have stuck together, praying, singing, breaking bread, waiting for the 'power from on high' (Luke 24:49). But there's another side to it.
They were not sure what they were waiting for! They did not understand their mission nor the idea of 'the Kingdom,' and they were probably still fearful.
Jerusalem was a mass with crowds celebrating the Jewish Pentecost. The gathering of Jewish Christians that morning was on two levels: 1, Waiting and 2, Lying Low
Crowds that could turn against Jesus at another Jewish festival (Passover) to crucify him could just as easily turn against his followers.
So there they were having meetings, holding elections, they may even have got a PCC (Parish Church Council) going! This was an Acts Chapter 1 Church. Inward facing, having organisational meetings, fearful, wondering what comes next. Today we can ask of ourselves, do we stay behind our Church doors as an Acts Chapter 1 Church, or do we open those doors to take the good news of Jesus outside? An Acts Chapter 2 type of Church that is outward-looking, that allows the Holy Spirit to flow through us and serves and ministers in our communities.
What was Pentecost to the Jews?
Remember that number ? Yes, 50. Passover was about the Exodus and killing an unblemished lamb to save the Jews from the last plague.
Pentecost, 50 days later, was said to commemorate the giving of the Law (10 Commandments) on Mt Sinai. That was what the Jews were in Jerusalem there to celebrate Shavuot, Pentecost, the giving of the Law (10 Commandments) Law after the Exodus from Egypt. This was a BIG holiday, a big festival to the people of Israel.
Now jump from Old Testament to New Testament, 50 days after Jesus the lamb of God was crucified and rose from the dead God chose to give the power of the Spirit (in contrast to the Law). Does this seem like a coincidence? No, this is Sovereign God at Pentecost entering time from eternity with pinpoint accuracy 50 days after the Resurrection when crowds of Jews are in Jerusalem to commemorate the Law THE SPIRIT COMES. This is God saying the Law has been impossible to keep; this is the new day, the day or the time of the Holy SPIRIT. The world has never been the same since that day because of that outpouring.
Imagine yourselves there, imagine were are in that upper room, and we are waiting.
See if we can learn afresh from this miraculous happening called Pentecost. I want to latch on to three verbs in these first three verses of Acts Chapter two. When the Holy Spirit came,
they heard
a sound like a violent wind (something big is happening), their expectations are rising, this is not a natural wind, this is supernatural Ruach (from heaven) (it is onomatopoeic). It doesn't say there was a violent wind, their hair wasn't blowing all over the place, no, they heard a sound like a violent wind Ruach.
Ruach is the same word we read in Genesis 2 when God created Adam. God breathed into a listless body, and there was his life in that body. A human being was formed living on the breath of God. The same Ruach that filled the room on the day of Acts Chapter 2.
These listless people gathered would have thought, this is it, this is what we have been waiting for. Fasten your seatbelts. God was breathing Ruach (Hebrew or Pneuma in Greek) to fill his Church with the Holy Spirit power to go out and minister for him.
The Church is not meant to be a body of people behind closed doors, barely alive, but a ministering and serving Church beyond our four walls. Verb 2:
they saw
what seemed like (supernatural) 'tongues of fire' (first as a flame which separated and rested on each, this is not something from within (it's from beyond). We do not usually think of this as a visual thing. Imagine if I saw a flame come down into the room here and separated and came and rested on each of you. They saw it. It didn't rest on the wardens and the music group and the preacher; it came to rest on each of them. They saw it.
The amazing thing about this fire is it didn't burn out, and it didn't burn them; it didn't consume them. Does that remind you of another bible story? Yes. Moses and the burning bush. It did not burn out, and it did not consume the bush. Ardens sed virens was the Latin Inscription on the stain glass window on the wall at Ahorey Presbyterian Church, my church when I was young in Northern Ireland.
Ardens sed virens means ‘Burning but flourishing.’ How I wish that for each of us, burning and flourishing. Moses was nowhere, the back of the desert, then he saw the flame on the bush, and soon he was burning and flourishing, he became one of the great Patriarchs.
Notice God does not need anything from us, he doesn't need us as fuel to burn, but as the Holy Spirit comes upon us, we flourish. He is all-sufficient, he does not need us to fuel his flame, and he does not burn out, nor does he want us to burn out for him.
That is a Pentecost message for us today. The fire wasn't burning up and wasn't burning them, but they flourished. There was not one person the flame did not alight on in that upper room, and there is not a person here today that God has not a plan for, a plan for you to flourish and minister for Him.
And finally, they spoke
Heard. Saw. Spoke in other tongues.
There is another Old Testament connection for us to note. You may not think of it initially. It is in Genesis 11 in the story of the building of the Tower of Babel. In that story, the Holy Spirit came upon them, but it was not a blessing; it was a curse. Babylon was known as the Godless centre of the known world at that time. It can be a picture of Godlessness in society, and we find ourselves in that place again today.
Babylon was a bunch of people who sought unity, sounded so peaceful and loving and so good and right. But it wasn't because they sought to glorify themselves and make a name for themselves. God said that is not how humanity should be; the Westminster Confession states,
'man's chief end is to glorify God and enjoy Him forever.'
So the people were building a tower of babel that would be seen for miles and would glorify the people. But the Holy Spirit came upon them, and they spoke with other tongues, but that time it was not a blessing; it was a curse because they could not comprehend each other. It divided them. They formed their own groups.
The reversal of that happened in Acts Chapter 2 when the Holy Spirit came upon the 120 gathered in that upper room, and they went out into the crowds of some 120,000 people speaking in tongues that the Holy Spirit blessed them with, and the crowds heard the message of Jesus in their own language.
The Holy Spirit coming upon them did not scatter them; it brought them together into the family of God, one body, many languages. The worldwide church with Jesus Christ as Lord and Saviour.
The tower of babel principle sounded so reasonable, one people, at peace and in loving harmony, but it was not a Godly unity. It was a worldly peace. Jesus says in John 14 his peace (shalom) is a peace the world cannot give. Derek Kidner's Genesis Commentary says 'division is better than collective apostacy.' There is a current danger in the Church that we are trying to find the lowest common denominator of unity, and that seems to be peace and love is all you need.
But it may be apostacy; the Godless society of that day sought to glorify themselves. The Holy Spirit divided them; in contrast, the blessing of the outpoured Holy Spirit was to bring them together through the gift of tongues.
What does that have to do with us here and now?
It has got everything to do with us here today.
This is not an event that just happened two thousand years ago; it is an outpouring which is for today. How do we apply this to our situation here and now?
God wants to ‘Ruach,’ breathe his life into us, an outpouring of the Holy Spirit. We do not have to be an inward looking organisation with meetings and PCCs with closed doors rather than open doors.
God's desire is that his fire would come and fall and rest on each of us and then send us out to our community and further afield. The question is this; are we going to be an Acts Chapter 1 church or an Acts Chapter 2 church? That's a good question for us to ask.
The Christian community that came out of that Pentecost outpouring became a generous Church, generous with their time and money. They were a Church of mission and in serving. They were a united Church, growing in truth, learning from the apostles, and that includes Paul's wonderful teaching on the meaning of Grace.
Three thousand people became Christians that day because these people, filled wit the Holy Spirit, went out. That's the Holy Spirit at work, that is not glorifying man.
That is the type of fellowship we want to be here today.
If you feel burdened or challenged by this today, invite the Holy Spirit to fall on you today.
'O breath of life come sweeping through us, revive our Church with life and power.
O breath of life come, cleanse, renew us and fit thy Church to meet this hour."
Amen
Quote from a Belfast lady, Bessie Head's 1920 Hymn, O Breath of Life.