STUDIES IN ACTS

�� One of the oldest festival days in history is the Festival of Pentecost. It was one of the favorites of the Jews for centuries before Christ, and it has been a significant day in the church for two thousand years.� It became the third great Christian feast after Christmas and Easter.� It marks the anniversary of the coming of the Holy Spirit.� Liturgical churches call it Whitsunday because of the early custom of wearing white clothes on this day to symbolize the illumination which the Holy Spirit brought.

Welcome, white day, a thousand suns,

�� Though seen at once, were black to thee;

For after their light, darkness comes,

�� But thine shines to eternity.�

�� In spite of the importance of this day it has been greatly neglected by many Christians.� Most of us would not even know it was Pentecost Sunday, which means 50 days after the resurrection of Christ.� The early church celebrated this day long before they did Christmas.� If we are unaware of this day it is due to the lack of understanding of the place of the Holy Spirit in the life of the church.� Dr. Norman Maclean was teaching the Apostle�s Creed to some students, and he had them stand in a row and each repeat a line.� One morning they began and the first student said, �I believe in God the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth.�� The next said, �I believe in Jesus Christ His only Son our Lord.�� This went on through all the doctrines, and then there was silence.� The boy who was next in line said, �Please sir, the boy who believes in the Holy Ghost is absent today.�� Dr. Maclean remarked, �Lots of folks are absent when it comes to that clause.��

�� E. Stanley Jones referring to the doctrine of the Holy Spirit said, �It is the undiscovered country of Christianity, the dark continent of the Christian life.� The land where our spiritual resources lie but undeveloped.�� The great need of the church, and of each individual Christian, is the power of the Holy Spirit.� It is the power to do the task for which we exist, and so we want to look at this first Pentecostal experience of the disciples in the light of their reception of power.�

I.� THE SECRET OF THEIR RECEPTION OF POWER.� v. 1

�� Jesus had commissioned His disciples to go into all the world and preach the Gospel, but He told them that they must first tarry in Jerusalem until they were endued with power from on high.� For 10 days after Jesus ascended they waited in obedience to His command.� Peter had finally learned to wait on the Lord.� He had finally learned to take orders and obey them with perfect confidence that Jesus knew what He was doing.� Ordinarily Peter�s nature would have caused him to say, �Wait! What do you mean wait!� We know Christ is alive now, for we have seen Him with our own eyes.� Why wait?� Let�s go tell the world right now.�� He would have gone out and instead of turning the world upside down, would have become an utter failure trying to do a supernatural work in his own natural powers.� But Peter knew better now.� He had tried his own power and discovered it was weakness.� He learned that you can have natural powers around you and behind you, but without supernatural power from above you, you can do nothing.� Like his Lord, he learned obedience by the things which he suffered.�

�� This was the secret of their reception of power.� They were all with one accord in one place.� There was unity in obedience to Christ.� No longer were the 12 anxious about who was going to set where in the kingdom.� All they knew was that Jesus had promised them power, and so in perfect harmony and in complete confidence they waited.� They were on the launching pad of preparation waiting for God�s countdown to reach the zero hour and send them soaring out into all the world with the Gospel.� After 10 days you would think that some division would arise.� It would have been easy for some to get impatient and begin to doubt the promise.� It is not easy to wait.

�� Themistocles, the famous Athenian general, once kept his men waiting during a navel battle.� At sunrise they were all ready to advance, but the order did not come.� As the hours passed the men became impatient.� Talk spread that he was not going to fight because he was afraid.� Themistocles knew what he was doing.� He knew there was a wind that came up in that region at a certain time of the day.� He waited for it to give the command so that he did not need as many men at the oars, but could have them in arms to fight.� He was waiting for greater power.� This is what the church was doing on that first Christian Pentecost.� They did so without questioning the wisdom of their Lord.� They obeyed because they had learned to take Him at His word with complete trust.� They made themselves available to receive the promised power.

�� Someone has said that it is not only your ability, but your availability that Jesus needs if He is to use you with power, and here we see them being available for the Master�s use.� If the church is to have power in any age, it must have these characteristics.� It must be united in allegiance to Jesus, and completely confident that He is able to do all things, and they must be available to be used as He sees fit. This means every local church must ask itself constantly, why do we exist?� What does God want us to do, and are we making ourselves available to be used?� A proper response to these questions will lead us, like the first believers, to the discovery of the secret of receiving power from on high.

II.� THE SIGNS OF THEIR RECEPTION OF POWER.� v. 2-3

�� God always gives signs when He performs a mighty act in history on behalf of men.� He appeals to the ears and eyes that men might know the work is of a divine and supernatural nature.� When God gave the law to Moses there was a loud voice of thunder and the terror of consuming fire.� When Jesus comes again there will be the blast of the trumpet, the great shout of the archangel, and the terrible fire that will melt the elements with fervent heat.� Sound and sight play a role in these great events, and so also in the Pentecostal event.� Pay careful attention to the language here.� The sound of the wind and the sight of the fire were real but not actual.� They were signs of the reality of the power they had received.� In verse 2 came a sound as of a rushing mighty wind.� In verse 3 appeared tongues like as fire.� There was no actual wind or fire, but the sound and the sight were real, and they symbolized the presence of God in power.

�� What could be a better symbol of the Holy Spirit than wind?� What else in the material world is present with such power, and yet it is invisible?� Jesus used wind as an illustration of the Spirit when He was talking to Nicodemus.� He said that you hear the sound of it but you cannot tell where it comes from and where it goes, and so it is with everyone born of the Spirit.� If God had not given this sign of the sound of wind, the Holy Spirit could have entered the believers in silence, and there would not have been this great outward evidence.� It was given here that the church might always trace its source of power to the Holy Spirit, and not to some psychological emotion within.� The wind symbolizes a power beyond man.� When God spoke to Job He spoke out of a whirlwind, and when God gave life to the dry bones in Ezekiel He did it with a wind.� Now at Pentecost He fills the house with the sound of a rushing mighty wind, but the filling of the house with sound is only a sign of the greater fact that He filled their hearts with the Spirit.� Now that the Spirit has come to abide with the church there can be the filling without the sign.

�� Fire is also a common sign of the presence of God.� He appeared to Moses in the burning bush, and He led Israel at night by a pillar of fire.� To the believer God is a cleansing fire, and to the unbeliever God is a consuming fire.� Fire is also a sign of God�s glory.� Why do the heaven�s declare the glory of God?� It is because of fire.� If the stars were cold masses of stone, and if the sun was but a flickering candle that kept us in perpetual gloom, where would be the glory?� It is the power of the blazing blinding brilliance of those fires in the sky that bring wonder into hearts and awe into our minds.� They kindle the flame of praise on our tongues.� It is when we see God�s power throughout the universe in the marvelous fires in the heavens that we sing My God How Great Thou Art.

�� Fire ought to characterize the church in the sense that it is filled with enthusiasm.� When we say a man is on fire, we mean that he is excited and enthused about what he is doing.� That is the picture of the church at Pentecost, and that is a sign of the power and presence of the Holy Spirit.� When the Spirit is present the church is on fire.� There is a story about two men watching a church burn.� The one who was a member says to the other, �I have never seen you at church before.�� The other man replies, �I never saw this church on fire before.�� When the church is on fire spiritually� it attracts people just as it does if it is physically on fire.� Enthusiasm is essential for attraction.� If believers are not excited about what they believe, why should anyone else be?�

�� Emerson once said, �Nothing great was ever achieved without enthusiasm.�� The very word comes from the Greek which means God within.� When God is within we are enthused.� This is a sign of a Spirit filled church and believers.� Put the two signs of wind and fire together and you get a picture of the early church spreading like wildfire.� Someone wrote a history of the early church and called it The Spreading Flame.� The church that is enthused about its message is a church with power, and so our prayer ought to be,

Grant us thy truth to make us free,

�� And kindling hearts that burn for thee,

Till all thy living altars claim

�� One holy light, one heavenly flame.

III.� THE SUCCESS OF THEIR RECEPTION OF POWER.

�� When Jesus gave the promise that they would receive power in Acts 1:8, He made it clear that the power was for the specific purpose of being witnesses of Him.� The power was given not to glorify the Spirit, or the believer, but to glorify Jesus Christ and make Him known to all peoples.� The test of whether or not a church is successful in receiving the power of God is whether or not it accomplishes the task for which the power is given.� If this group at Pentecost would have ran out and sold all they had, and bought material to build a large church in Jerusalem, that would have been a display of dedication, but Pentecost would have been a failure.� So it is with the church today.� No matter how impressive a church is, if it does not accomplish the task of the church, which is to be a witness for Jesus, then all of its show of power is in vain.� It is only natural power, and the supernatural is missing.

�� The church on Pentecost did not fail.� It had tremendous success, for it was noised aboard that something unusual had happened.� The Jews visiting Jerusalem out of every nation gathered where the disciples were.� People were amazed for they heard them speaking of the wonderful works of God in their own language.� For 3 years the disciples had listened to Jesus proclaim the wonderful works of God, but now they are carrying on in His place by the power which He sent to indwell His new body the church.� No longer were they afraid to take a public stand for Jesus.� Peter, who a month before did not have the courage to admit he knew Jesus, now without a tinge of fear stands in this great crowd and proclaims Jesus as Lord.�

�� The success of Pentecost was due to the fact that the disciples were now under new management.� They were not self-centered and worried about power, possessions and position, but they were Christ-centered, and His will alone is all that mattered.� For 10 days they had patiently waited with their focus on Jesus, and now they could be trusted with power because they were aimed right.� If they had followed their own wills for their own ends, God could not have given the power, for this would be like pushing on the gas pedal when the car is aimed toward the ditch.� Success came because they were on the right path of obedience and submission to the will of God.� They were ready to come under the Spirit�s control.� With such an attitude they overcame all fear.

�� Diognetius was brought before a heathen king, and the tyrant said, �Do you know what I can do for you?�� The saints said, �You cannot harm me my life is hid with Christ in God.�� The king said, �I will strip you of all your possessions.� The saint replied, �You cannot reach them, my treasure is in heaven.�� The king said, �I will exile you to a barren island.�� The saint replied, �Nothing can separate me from the love of God in Christ Jesus my Lord.�� The king said, �Then I will kill you.�� The saint responded, �You will but send me to be with Christ which is far better.�� With such a faith as this there is no room for fear.

�� It was with this kind of fearlessness that the early church witnessed and had such success.� Peter preached a sermon that day that exalted Jesus and bore more fruit than all the sermons that Jesus himself had preached.� Jesus said they would do greater things than he, and here at Pentecost that saying was fulfilled.� The power of the Holy Spirit was successfully applied because Jesus was made central.� Three thousand souls found him as their Savior, and that was the purpose for which the power was given.

�� A Welsh miner who was converted in the 1959 revival said, �When I was a boy we dug coal out with chisels.� After that came dynamite, and with this we could mine a much bigger quantity of coal.� Till this week I have seen nothing but chisel work in religion, but now here is God�s dynamite at work.�� The Gospel is the dynamite of God said Paul.� Why should we try to reach the world on the chisel level when the promise of the Pentecostal power is available to all believers?� If we make the task of being witnesses to Jesus the primary goal of our lives, as did these first believers, we too could make a great impact by the power of the Spirit.�

2.�� THE THRONE OF DAVID�� Based on Act 2:22-36

�� A. M. Fairbairn said, �The task of reason is to make impossible all religion save the best.�� This was the attitude of Peter and Paul the great evangelists of the early church.� They were determined to use all the reason and logic at their disposal to persuade men to see that Jesus Christ was the only hope.� We do not find them using force or any subtle tricks to win people.� They use the Scripture and contemporary historical facts to cause men to see the truth.� Just to give you a picture of how consistently Paul persuaded men, let me read several passages.�

�� In Acts 13:43 we read, �Now when the congregation was broken up many of the Jews and religious proselytes followed Paul and Barnabas, who speaking to them, persuaded them to continue in the grace of God.�� In Acts 18:4 we read, �And he reasoned in the synagogue every Sabbath, and persuaded the Jews and Greeks.�� In Acts 19:8, �And he went into the synagogue, and spake boldly for the space of three months, disputing and persuading the things concerning the kingdom of God.�� In the last reference we see that Paul sought to persuade men to his dying day.� In Acts 28:23 we read, �...there came many to him unto his lodging; to whom he expounded and testified the kingdom of God, persuading them concerning Jesus, both out of the law of Moses, and out of the prophets, from morning til evening.�

�� Try and visualize what this means.� Paul was constantly going over the Old Testament and showing how it was fulfilled in Jesus Christ.� Hours and hours he spent with the Jews who knew the Old Testament.� It was for 3 months in one place.� Imagine how they covered every conceivable Messianic passage.� The Jews would seek to show how they were not yet fulfilled, and Paul would show them how Jesus did fulfill them, just as Peter is doing at Pentecost.� Now to make the picture perfect let me read to you the words of Jesus as He rebuked the two on the road to Emmaus.� In Luke 24:25-27 we read, �..O fools, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken: ought not Christ to have suffered these things and to enter into His glory?� And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, He expounded unto them in all the Scriptures the things concerning Himself.��

�� Nothing is more clearly taught in the New Testament than the fact that Jesus was the focus point of all the Old Testament prophecies, and that the New Testament church used fulfilled prophecy as the greatest method of persuading Jews to receive Jesus as their Messiah.� The tragedy is that this method of evangelism was laid aside in favor of force, and the result was that the church became the biggest wall between Jews and Jesus.� The church began to force Jews to be baptized.� The Inquisition in Spain had a demonic scheme whereby they could eliminate Jews.� They were forced to be baptized and become Christians, and then they were tried for being heretical Christians, and the penalty was death.� Then all the property of heretics went to the church.

�� Jacob Jocz in The Jewish People And Jesus Christ records the whole shocking history of this abuse of power right up to modern times.� He writes, �The compulsory hearing of sermons by Jews in Christian churches was already practiced in the 13th century.� Two centuries later it became a general custom, especially in Italy.� Abrahams records the comic situation that the ears of the Jews use to be examined on entering the churches for they were suspected of stopping them with cotton.� Overseers were appointed to ensure that the Jews remained awake during the 2 hour sermon delivered to them...the Bull of Benedict XIII of 1415 decreed that 3 public sermons were to be preached to the Jews annually and that all above 12 years of age should be compelled to attend to hear these sermons.�

�� It was not until the 18th century that the church got back to the New Testament method of persuasion, and Jews again began to receive Jesus as their Messiah.� History demonstrates that Peter was led of the Holy Spirit in his sermon at Pentecost, for the only way devout Jews could be won would be by a persuasive demonstration that Jesus of Nazareth fulfilled the messianic prophecies.

�� Peter had made it clear that as Jews they were guilty for the death of Jesus, whom they admitted who was a worker of miracles and a man of God.� Now in verse 24 he states that God raised him up.� God did not accept the judgment of the Jews.� Their court gave Him up to death, but the supreme court, which was God himself, raised Him up to life.� He was loosed from death, for it was impossible for Jesus to remain bound by its cords.� It had no power over Him in the first place, but He submitted to it for our sakes.� He knew it could not hold Him, and to say that of Jesus is to say that He was God.� George Matheson says, �There is no miracle in the resurrection of Christ.� There would have been a miracle if He had not risen.�� It was just not possible for Him to remain in the grip of death, and so the resurrection was natural from God�s point of view.� His body was transformed, however, and this made it a miracle.�

�� In verse 25 to 28 Peter supports his statement that it was not possible for Jesus to be held by death by appealing to the words of David in Psa. 16:8-11.� Peter says that it applies to Jesus, for He was confident in going to the cross, and He died voluntarily because He was assured of God�s presence and promise that He would not forsake His body or soul but would be preserved through death.� In verse 29 He says men and brethern let me speak frankly.� That is, do not be offended by what I say, for I reverence David also, but let�s face the facts.� David is dead and buried, and his tomb is with us yet today.� David could not have been speaking of himself, for just the opposite happened to him.� His body did see corruption, and so David spoke of another, or else his hope was false.�

�� In verse 30 we see David was writing about one whom he knew would come because God had promised that a Messiah would set on his throne.� This promise can be read in II Sam. 7:11-16, where it is clear that Solomon was the literal fulfillment, but where the emphasis on the kingdom being forever implies a future fulfillment.� The emphasis on the sworn oath of God in this promise is found in Psa. 89:3-4 where read, �...I have made a covenant with my chosen one, I have sworn to David my servant: I will establish your descendants forever, and build your throne for all generations.�� Then in verse 36 we read, �His line shall endure forever, his throne as long as the sun before me.��

�� In verse 31 Peter says that David saw ahead and knew this promise was to be fulfilled by Christ in the resurrection.�� David was a Christian before Christ, for he believed in the resurrection and confessed Christ as Lord.� He foresaw that Messiah must die and conquer death, for he was to be an immortal king who would take the throne of David and never again depart.� The Jews did not see this in Old Testament prophecy.� They apparently never thought deeply enough about how Messiah could live forever without first conquering death, and the sin that causes death.� David knew Messiah must be raised from death, and Peter goes on in verse 32 to say that this Jesus of whom we have been speaking was raised by God just as David said would happen to Messiah, and we are witnesses to this fact.� There was no reason to doubt these 120 respectable Jewish citizens.

�� In verse 33 he goes on to say that Jesus is by the right hand of God and having received the promise of the Holy Spirit, He is the author of what you now see and hear. In verse 34 he says that it is not David on the throne in heaven fulfilling his own words, for he said, �The Lord said unto my Lord set thou on my right hand.�� It was Jehovah saying this to Christ.� David calls Jesus his Lord.� Jesus used this passage to confuse the Pharisees in Matt. 22:41-46.� He asked them how Messiah could be the son of David when David calls Him Lord?� It was a contradiction they could not answer.� How could the Christ be the son of David and also the Lord of David?� The only way would be by being both God and man.� He would have to be born of a woman and yet be deity.� This is precisely how Jesus fulfilled both concepts, and how He ascended to the throne of David as the seed of David in the flesh.� He was both the son of David and the Son of God.

�� In verse 36 Peter concludes that all the house of Israel should know for sure that God has made that same Jesus whom you crucified to be both Lord and Christ.� He is on David�s throne and will be so forever.� But what about the postponed kingdom that prophecy experts are always talking about?� Didn�t the Jews reject Jesus and cause Him to postpone taking the throne?� I don�t read anything about such a postponement.� All that is clear is that Christ took the throne and nothing was postponed.� All the prophecies of Moses and the prophets were fulfilled in Him.� The New Testament is consistent and insistent on the fact that Jesus now reigns as Lord supreme with all power in heaven and on earth.�

�� When Gabriel announced the birth of Jesus to the virgin Mary he said in Luke 1:32-33, �He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the Highest, and the Lord God shall give Him the throne of His father David, and He shall reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of His kingdom there shall be no end.�� When was this fulfilled?� Peter and all the New Testament writers say it was fulfilled at the ascension of Christ to the right hand of the Father.� No prophecies could be more completely fulfilled than those concerning Jesus ascending to the throne of David.��

��

3.�� PROPHECY FULFILLED� �Based on Acts 2:22f

�� In no area of biblical studies have Christians been more often deceived then in the area of prophecy.� The early church fathers got caught up in wild spiritualizing of the Old Testament.� They found profound revelations where there were none.� It became so subjective that you could make Scripture mean anything you wanted it to mean, and this abuse led to reaction which went to the other extreme of literalism.� This led to just as foolish conclusions as the other extreme.� A cult in East Africa, for example, says you must have 2, 4, 6 or 8 wives because the Bible says, �Do not be unequally yoked together.��

�� This an extreme example, but it is not isolated.� When a freshman at Bethel, I and my roommate ran on to a book by a well known evangelical that found predictions in the prophets of all kinds of modern inventions such as cars, planes and bombs.� We were excited and thought this was proof of the Bible�s inspiration, and many Christians think the same way today because they think the Bible foretells everything that is going on in the world.� This is a totally erroneous view of Revelation that ignores the basic truth that the Bible is a revelation of God�s redemptive plan, and not to be used to satisfy the curiosity of people by seeming to predict modern inventions.� This degrades the Bible and puts it in the same category with those who pretend to predict the future today.�

�� Prophecy is also perverted in every generation by those who feel it was all written for just their day. There is a whole graveyard full of old prophecy books that died along with the people who are suppose to be the anti-Christ.� Many Popes, kings, and rulers, like Napoleon, and more recently Hitler and Mussolini, were all thought to be the fulfillment of prophecy.� Men who can pinpoint God�s plan, and even name names, always draw good crowds, but so far they have never been right.� Those who name him when the real anti-Christ appears are bound to at last be right, but then no one will need a book to tell them, for it will be obvious.�

�� Meanwhile the dangers of self-appointed prophets are great.� They often cause division and get Christian people to be lopsided in their view of God�s plan.� They try and make you think that figuring out which ten rulers or nations are the ten heads of the beasts is the real goal of Bible study.� Andrew Murray once led a group of people who would not come to hear him preach because the notes in their Bible said the ten heads of the beasts were kings of Europe, one of which was the king of England, and since Murray was a salaried servant of the British Empire he was considered to be a servant of anti-Christ.� Murray said he hardly knew whether to weep or smile at some of their explanations of the prophecies.

�� In every age the cults major on prophecy.� The Jehovah Witnesses have volume after volume on prophecy, and they do an amazing amount of research in this area.� I have read some and find it is usually no more wild in its speculations than are those of evangelicals who consider themselves to be authorities in this area.� It seems that no one can tolerate a mystery, and so everyone must have definite answers no matter how subjective they may be.� Louis H. Evans in his book Life�s Hidden Power writes, �Some people have placed too much emphasis on prophecy; their minds have run rampant on the subject, and they have given themselves over to an unregenerate form of �guessing� to weird predictions and prophetic fantasies.� Taking advantage of a natural desire to look around the corner of the day after tomorrow, many �prophets� have become profiteers.� This abuse of prophecy has arisen out of a disuse of prophecy; so many teachers and preachers have shied away from the subject that they have left their poor congregations without any standards of interpretation that are either sane, scholarly or scriptural, and their people have become easy prey to those wild cults of prophecy which have spawned in a vacuum existing only because the church has not been willing to deal with the problem in a sensible and scholarly fashion.�

�� Before we look then at Peter�s interpretation of prophecy let me share with you 3 basic rules of interpretation, which if followed will keep you from many perversions of God�s Word.

1.� The New Testament interprets the Old Testament.� Then New Testament fulfills, modifies and eliminates much of the Old Testament.� Nothing in the Old Testament is now applicable that contradicts the New Testament, or is incompatible with God�s final revelation in Christ.�

2.� Systematic passages interpret the incidental.� It is by neglecting this principle that the Pharisees perverted God�s Word.� They exaggerated the incidental and ignored the essential.� They were preoccupied with triviality.� God�s Word deals with great themes, and so it is poor stewardship of time and thought to major on minors.�

3.� Didactic passages interpret the symbolic.� When an author is teaching and following a line of reasoning to bring you to a definite conclusion, that kind of passage is always superior to one where the symbolism may be mysterious, and where the author is conveying and impression by poetic language and verbal picture drawing.� This principle is basic in Peter�s sermon, for he is using prophecy to show a very specific teaching.� He is following a logical pattern, and what he is saying is so clear that his conclusions must be followed in the interpretation of any other passage where the same theme is covered.�

�� All of the passages about the Messiah setting on the throne of David are to be seen in the light of Peter�s sermon.� If Peter is right and the prophecies were literally fulfilled in Christ�s ascension, they it follows that we do not look for this in the future, for Jesus has already taken the throne and reigns now.� If we argue that there is to be a second fulfillment then we minimize the central theme of t