The disciples were afraid of the Jewish leaders, and on the evening of that same Sunday they locked themselves in a room. They'd likely not seen it. Pentecost was a Jewish festival fifty days after the Passover. And those days you didn't fear getting on a Greyhound bus, and you could go all over the country on a very cheap pass. The Christian aeon is a renewed order, a new creation. And then going on here, in verse 44, "He said to them, 'These are the words which I spoke to you while I was still with you, that all things must be fulfilled which were written in the Law of Moses, and the prophets, and the Psalms concerning Me.' The disciples said to him, "Lord, if he has fallen asleep, he will recover." Now Jesus had spoken of his death, but they thought that he meant taking rest in sleep. and there appeared to them tongues as of fire, distributed and resting on each one of them. Though the emperor, a man named Tiberius, had been holed up on an island called Capri or Capri for a number of years in absentia, the empire was running quite well on its own. But then two angels appeared and they said to them, in verse 11, "Men of Galilee, why do you stand gazing into heaven? At the end of John, you remember, John says, there were so many other things that He did in his life and no doubt probably part of that 40-day period that it would take volumes to teach it, and to record it during this period. The dam was completed in 1970 and in 1971 there was a grand dedication ceremony and the 12 turbines with their ten billion kilowatt-hour capacity were unleashed with enough power to light every city in Egypt. The best answers are voted up and rise to the top, Not the answer you're looking for? They had not been a part of anything like that before. The man with the epileptic son initially brought his son to the disciples to be cured. It is I. Don't be afraid.'" And in the book of Revelation, John reports an experience similar to Daniel's. The people who have faith in me without seeing me are the ones who are really blessed!. Hagiographical sources also portray saints as those able to withstand the fear or deceit brought . If we can borrow a phrase that we've used over the last two years, two phrases, they labored in the Word and they lived in the Word. I also think this is true in some way, but in gospels there is record that Jesus 'gave them authority over devils and diseases and sent them to preach gospel, to heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead. Our sins will find us out. [Darris McNeely] On the morning of Pentecost 31 AD, what do you think was going through the minds of the assembled disciples in Jerusalem? Egypt's President Nasser announced the plan for construction in 1953. But Thomas said, First, I must see the nail scars in his hands and touch them with my finger. 2. How do we handle them? '", And so Luke's account gives us a very specific instruction, how He told them, You wait in Jerusalem and then you will receive the power from on high. And that is what they were doing as they waited for that period of time to come about. And a voice from heaven like many waters, and the voice of thunder, and the sound of harpers playing their harps, they sang as it were a new song before the throne, before the four living creatures and the elders. We sometimes just kind of tail off when we get to the end of one of the Gospels and we know the events, Christ was crucified, Christ was risen, and we don't look at some of the details there. For example, when Moses gathered with the seventy elders of Israel at the tabernacle, it says in Numbers 11:25, "The Lord came down in the cloud and spoke to him and took some of the Spirit that was upon him and put it upon the seventy elders; and when the Spirit rested upon them, they prophesied. 3 For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. Labor in the Word, meaning to read the Word, and to learn it, and to soak it in and drink it in; and to live the Word, this past year. I've got to find out where that next bus leaves, and what time." There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. He also is a residentfaculty member at the Ambassador Bible Center teaching Acts, Fundamentals of Belief and World News and Prophecy. From the Day of Pentecost, when they had been baptized by the power of the Holy Spirit, they were equipped to go into the world. And of course, one of the most dramatic scenes in all the Bible occurred with the descent of the Holy Spirit upon the gathered disciples, and the speaking in tongues, and a mighty rushing wind that we find it hard to imagine what it was like, because it's not part of our custom to try to pray that down today like some other denominations and religious forms do. Having Peter's undivided attention, Jesus spoke of the eventual crossing of Peter's own finish line. We can internalize that and think that through. 3 For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. Or is this authority that I mentioned just about Jesus' own power he gave them and isn't about Spirit in themselves like when he said to Peter to cast net into water and pulled out much fishes? When they heard that He was alive and had been seen by her, they did not believe. An eyewitness account, there was a lack of belief that put them in the situation here that they did not understand and didn't believe that had actually happened. I like that phrase. It was a mighty, powerful machine, the most powerful that the world in that day had ever seen. For example, in the life of Samson we read, "The Spirit of the Lord came mightily upon him and he tore the lion asunder as one tears a kid" (Judges 14:6). Was the gift of the Holy Spirit promised only for the first-century Church, according to Acts 2:38-39? They had hoped He would overcome the power of the Roman government and establish a new kingdom, and now their hopes of this vanished. The OT believers were saved the same way we are: they were born of the Spirit, they trusted in God's promises, and they followed his commandments in the obedience of faith. How does a fan in a turbofan engine suck air in? 1 When the day of Pentecost came, they were all together in one place. 7 For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to Gods law; indeed, it cannot. So it's something for us to examine in our own way, see how much of that is being demonstrated in our life. I kind of think that He kind of, you know, elevated, and rose, and they saw Him, and they saw Him and the clouds, and the clouds, and then all of a sudden just like that, [snaps fingers] He was gone, kind of like in a "Star Trek" just a flash of light. "If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained." Expand He quotes Joel, he quotes Psalms and he gives interpretations upon those scriptures, here in chapter 1, no one had ever heard of before. But Jesus immediately said to them: 'Take courage! Darris is the Associate Media Producer for the Church. They didn't believe that He had risen, they didn't believe that they had been seen, that He had been seen, and therefore, then they would not believe these eyewitnesses. The Jewish authorities of their day had a very thorough doctrinal review process and Peter's would not have passed, which is why they ran smack in trouble with the Jewish leadership from this point forward because they were applying new meaning to old Scriptures that no Jew had ever heard before. It commemorates the descent of the Holy Spirit upon the Apostles and other followers of Jesus Christ while they were in Jerusalem celebrating the Feast of Weeks, as described in the Acts of the Apostles (Acts 2:1-31). As we have received the gift of God's Spirit, as those on that first day of Pentecost received the gift of the Holy Spirit were brought into the Church, they became, and so are we, partakers of the divine nature. As we came here this morning, to services, and as we gathered here this morning ourselves, there is a very important lesson for us to learn as well. 7:50; 19:9). Did they doubt that it was real? Although John does not say this is the point when the disciples were born again, or that was when the New Covenant started, Erwin takes it to mean both: "it marks the transition from the terms of the old covenant to those of the new covenant" (p. 20). Again, the answer is yes. It goes on, "Jesus came and He spoke to them saying, 'All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. People should see that in us. Summary of Ideas of the Sunday readings. Colossians 2:15 Colossians 2:15 And having spoiled principalities and powers, he made a show of them openly, triumphing over them in it.American King James Version, tells us that He disarmed the powers with His death. Praying a Scriptural Rosary is accomplished by praying a traditional Rosary and adding scriptural verses related to each mystery of the Rosary. Not only apostles, but even the prophets of the Old Testament, who are lower than apostles, had a degree of presence of Spirit in themselves, through Whom they prophesied (needn't to give references, for they are so numerous!). Could very old employee stock options still be accessible and viable? Surely we have need today of men and women filled by the Spirit to expose and denounce evils in our society that are hardly blinked at any more: the exploitation of women's bodies and debasement in advertising, the unconscionable destruction of human life through abortion on demand, the maneuvers of our own country to destabilize other governments, the gross waste and gluttony of American life, the cavalier attitude to divorce and remarriage which God hates, and the multi-million dollar promotion of alcohol and cigarettes as anything less than family-destroyers and body-killers. In Colossians chapter 1, Colossians 1:27 Colossians 1:27 To whom God would make known what is the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles; which is Christ in you, the hope of glory:American King James Version, Paul writes, "To them, God will to make known what are the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles which is Christ in you, the hope of glory." Copy. Luke 2:25-27. The gospels and the book of Acts tell us that would-be zealots and messiahs had come and gone. The disciples stood gazing, and they didn't know what to do. They saw it in different ways and understood it completely different from anything from our frame of reference and they were ascribing, would have been ascribing then even to Jesus something that was not of God, which in itself can be a problem. But I had to go to St. Louis about 100 miles north of my hometown and pick up what they called an express bus, that would go through the larger cities. So He begins to teach them from the Scriptures that they might understand, and that they might comprehend what He was and how He had fulfilled everything that they would have understood to one degree, and then even more they had begun to develop a fuller understanding of the prophecies of Isaiah, or Joel, or Jeremiah, or Ezekiel, the statements about the Messiah. From this point, they had only 10 days. When I was 15 years old, I got on a bus from my little hometown of Cape Girardeau, Missouri. Prior to Pentecost, the Apostles, though often zealous and willing to make sacrifices to follow Jesus, were also slow to understand and often confused. Verses 40 to 47 is a summary of one of the most remarkable periods of the church experience. In the New Testament, Elisabeth, John the Forerunner's mother, was filled with Spirit as she saw the pregnant Virgin, and she prophesied immediately (Luke 1:39-41) and so did the old widow-prophetess Anna at vision of Jesus taken to the temple (Luke 2:36-38); John the Forerunner himself was filled with Holy Spirit from his childhood (Luke 1:15), and of course the apostles, even before the Pentecost, had a degree of presence of Spirit in them (at least no less than John the Forerunner), through which presence they could act miracles; they got even to a greater degree of intensity the gift of the Spirit, when Jesus - before the Pentecost - blew in them the Spirit and added to them (through this new dimension of the presence of Spirit) an ability to forgive sins (John 20:22). To subscribe to this RSS feed, copy and paste this URL into your RSS reader. And in their mouth was found no deceit, for they are without fault before the throne of God.". As Jesus' disciples they may be afraid of someone that would deliver them to soldiers to punish them for taking part in 'rebellion' (as occupants may see it). And that is of people led by the Holy Spirit, knit together, everyone providing that which they can toward a community of faith, power, and love, sharing, looking out after one another and caring for one another. I don't think it was an intergalactic tour that He was on to get to the third heaven. Jesus took all believers out of Hades ten days before Pentecost, when He ascended into the third heaven. And again, He gives, through Mark's account here, He gives the same commission to go. To learn more, see our tips on writing great answers. Luke 1:15 says that John the Baptist was filled with the Spirit from his mother's womband he got his head chopped off for denouncing Herod's unlawful marriage. They thought that Jesus Himself didn't actually know that asleep people wake up? But that was a life lesson that I had to learn. "Standing with the Lamb on the Mount of Olives," in Revelation 14:1 Revelation 14:1And I looked, and, see, a Lamb stood on the mount Sion, and with him an hundred forty and four thousand, having his Father's name written in their foreheads.American King James Version, "144,000 with the Father's name written on their foreheads. . So, as Jesus Christ was teaching His disciples to focus on the things pertaining to the Kingdom of God during the time between His resurrection and Pentecost, we can be focusing on that now too. It gives me a lot of encouragement, when I am called to go places where I feel insecure, to know that the Spirit is within to give me the words I need and that he is also already in the place where I am going to prepare the way and to hold me when I get there. A fellowship, a community, prayer, sharing food together, much like we do today. Maybe a few more decided to go to Jerusalem on Pentecost to see what was going on, and the town was bursting at the seams, and from all these nations that we're told about here and areas. They sold their possessions, they divided among them, they shared among those who had need. This morning let me close simply by returning to the Aswan High Dam for a moment. Apparently not. This was just three and a half years, and in really a few weeks, seven weeks and a day of intense thought, emotion, that they had to grapple with and deal with as they came into the presence of one another on the morning of Pentecost. This means that the disciples could not have Christ in them, as we born again believers have, until the day of Pentecost. Where do we go from here? For 33 years, he served as pastor of Bethlehem Baptist Church, Minneapolis, Minnesota. Did they doubt what they were seeing? In Revelation chapter 14, we are given an image of the firstfruits, called the 144,000 in this part of the Revelation. The NT first Pentecost was the demarcation point when the Holy Spirit first indwelled people. A Church that was grounded in the Word of God. I hope you share this world view with the OT saints: namely, that your conception as a person in your mother's womb was a sovereign act of creation by God's Spirit and that every breath you take now and every chemical transaction in the cells of your body is sustained every moment by work of the Holy Spirit. And this small group of people who had signed on to what they thought was a remarkable, gifted rabbi, and followed Him around and soon learned that they had fallen into something quite different than anything they could have ever imagined, as they witnessed miracles of loaves and fishes, and people being brought back to life, and dramatic healings. Jesus showed Himself for 40 days after the resurrection (Acts 1:3). If we begin to look at one another as less than trustworthy, then that has other consequences in relationships, and that's taking place among the disciples here at this moment. Where is it being manifested in the church today? We've just read it. They sailed on it in the moonlight and wrote songs about it. Ninth, the Spirit enabled some OT believers to interpret God's revelation in dreams. He used Deborah and the tribe of Zebulun (the mountain may have been in their land) in the sermon. Not completely unraveled, but the doubt and the disbelief has an impact. As such, it requires a sabbath. Biblical Hermeneutics Stack Exchange is a question and answer site for professors, theologians, and those interested in exegetical analysis of biblical texts. Week 8 to Pentecost. Zechariah's prophecy in chapter 14 shows that Christ will, on that day, set foot on the Mount of Olives. The NIV adds the word "disciples," saying, "The disciples were astonished, while those who followed were afraid." But the word "disciples" is not in the Textus Receptus Greek text. The disciples had seen Jesus reach out across ethnic and religious divides birth in His parables and in real life. Which again points forward to the last days inaugurated at Pentecost. It goes on, verse 12, "After that, He appeared in another form to two of them as they walked and went into the country." I am not comfortable with that speculation. So here's my answer to why the experience of the Old Testament saints is valuable for us today. Behold I send the promise of My Father upon you, but tarryor waitin the city of Jerusalem until you are endued with power from on high. In verse 14, it says, "Then later He appeared to the eleven as they sat at the table and He rebuked them, rebuked their unbelief and hardness of heart because they did not believe those who had seen Him after He had risen." 3 days by their calendar. So Jesus had to rebuke them. When thou sendest forth thy Spirit, they are created; and thou renewest the face of the ground.". . When He approached, they thought they saw a spirit and were afraid, and of course, Peter became afraid when he saw the waves and felt the wind, when he was attempting to walk on the waves to Jesus. There are two groups of humans: those in the flesh (born of the flesh) and those in the Spirit (born again of the Spirit). But let's go back, let's look at a few of these scriptures in a little bit more detail and see exactly what had been taking place among the disciples during this period of time, that brought them to that morning of Pentecost. And I can't help but think that knowledge for its own sake or art for art's sake is a very callous and unloving motto. Jesus came in while the doors were still locked and stood in the middle of the group. Handle Me and see, for a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have." So it was a bodily appearance that He made completely to them, and He showed them His hands and His feet. And you can begin to imagine how this dynamic begins to must have been being set up within the disciples, because when you begin to doubt one another, you begin to lose trust. Afterwards, though, they go about with the boldness described here. "And all who believed were together and they had all things in common. What did they do during that 10 days? They had a lot of fear. Then the disciples were glad when they saw the Lord. We take that for the story that it is, and the gift of tongues, and the speaking of tongues that the Scriptures talk about but we don't see that as what we need to be doing in practice or in faith, but it is a dramatic story. Do Christians receive the Holy Spirit upon conversion or not (Ephesians 1:13 vs. Acts 8:14-17; 19:1-7)? " They were able to do the things Jesus gave them authority to do and they found it amazing. No one could learn that song except the 144,000 who were redeemed from the earth. The bonds of trust among the disciples were beginning to be frayed. So if I can come back to the question that I asked, what was going through their mind on that morning of Pentecost? He understood that, and again, He is just laying it out that they were troubled and there was doubt. And to live with the reality that there is a God who judges, who sees, and who knows. When did the disciples become born -again? That is how the mission of the Church is done and that is how then that vision of a community, of a Church, of a people who are rooted in the Word of God, who actually do care for one another, is accomplished; by no other means, by no other means. Second, the OT believers experienced the new birth and indwelling of the Holy Spirit. 157 views, 3 likes, 4 loves, 3 comments, 2 shares, Facebook Watch Videos from Mora Grace Lutheran Church: Music used with permission from CCLI My Spirit abides among you. It's an informed sermon. Learning and labor which do not lead people in love to God are not prompted by the Spirit of Christ. That is what caused people to see something in those disciples and to want to be a part of it. This is what He does as He moves them through the Law of Moses, the Psalms, and the prophets, and opening their understanding. I was 15 years old, I got on a bus from my little hometown of Cape Girardeau, what were the disciples afraid of before pentecost... A Scriptural Rosary is accomplished by praying a Scriptural Rosary is accomplished by praying a Rosary., the Spirit enabled some OT believers experienced the new birth and indwelling of the Revelation song except the in... 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