May 31st, 2020 Acts 2:1-21 Benson Sermon – Pastor Frank Rose Pentecost teaches us how we should expect God to interact with us as New Testament followers of Christ. God wants to interact with you in a close and powerful way. That’s a unique answer to an important question. How can I interact with God? Usually the answer is either: God is close, but not powerful; or: God is powerful, but far away. And it makes sense. If God is so powerful that he can harm me, it’s better if he’s far away. But if I want a God who is close, it better be a tame God, an impersonal God, a God who won’t change my life beyond my comfort level. But at Pentecost, we find a God who comes close, and impacts people powerfully. As a result of Pentecost, we should expect God to interact with us in that close and powerful way. One way we see him coming close and powerful is when God the Holy Spirit came in the form of fire. God coming as fire happened at different times in the Bible. But at Pentecost the fire is different. To understand how different, we need to remember what Pentecost was about before the events of Acts 2 happened. The believers of Jesus were gathered together to celebrate a holiday. This was one of 3 holidays that God commanded through Moses in which all the people were told to gather together. Pentecost primarily was a celebration of the first portion of the spring harvest. The people were thanking God, who took them from a group of slaves who could not grow their own produce, to a people who inherited a beautiful land in which they could grow and keep their own crops. They were thanking God for their freedom, and acknowledging that their food and produce comes from him, not their own intelligence or skill. But Pentecost also commemorated another significant event, and it involved God appearing in the form of fire. Consider this sequence of events: the Passover lamb was killed, the next day the Israelites left Egypt, they crossed the Red Sea, did some traveling, arrived at Mount Sinai, and God appeared with fire on the mountain. Moses went up to the fire of God to get the law of God which would identify the people of Israel as the special people of God on earth. Moses went to the fire 53 days after the Passover evening. Then fast forward over a thousand years. Jesus ate the Passover with his disciples on a Thursday, died on a Friday, rose on a Sunday, 40 days later ascended, 10 days after that Pentecost happened. It was 53 days after Passover, 50 days after his resurrection. There is historical evidence that the Jewish people who celebrated Pentecost at that time, not only celebrated it as the first fruits of the spring harvest, but as a remembrance of the fire of God on Mt Sinai. So, we need to do some comparing of Sinai to Pentecost event. In both God shows up as fire. At Sinai, the fire was terrifying. God descended on the mountain, with visible fire and billowing smoke. The ground shock and a loud noise blared in the ears. The people were terrified and said, “We don’t want to go near the fire, or we’ll be destroyed.” So they asked that only one person, Moses would go up to the fire and risk it. The rest stayed away from the terrifying fire of God. But at the second Pentecost fire in Acts 2, things are different. God came in fire once again, but the fire was much gentler, less frightening. This fire attracted people to come closer, rather than terrify them and repel them. Now, why the difference? First why the terrifying fire at Sinai? God was sending a clear message: Approach on my terms or not at all. God is like fire; he can keep you from freezing, or turn you to ashes. His presence can provide warmth, or pain. The people coming out of Egypt needed training. They needed to learn for example that you don’t get to have a wild party with a golden calf and all kinds of immorality and call it worship of God. They needed to worship on his terms, or else they risked being consumed in the fire of judgment. We need the same message. We don’t presume to approach God and say, “I think I should be able to worship you this way.” That’s not how it works. He’s like fire. Respect the fire’s power, or be
burned up. Now the good news is that when we come to God and seek his terms not ours, his terms are incredibly beneficial to us, he deals with us on the basis of mercy and grace; and that actually was there at Sinai too. But there are problems that come with God interacting with people mainly as terrifying fire. We can misinterpret the message. When we think of God only as terrifying fire, and forget the mercy and grace, we get off track in 2 directions: pride and despair. We’re capable of a pride which says, “God is a consuming fire, but I’m a good person, so I don’t have to worry, he accepts me on the basis on my goodness.” The danger of this attitude is that one day the full fire of judgment will come, and if you think your inherent goodness will make you fireproof, you are wrong, and you’ll find out just how wrong you were for all eternity. On other side is despair. Despair says, “If God is a consuming fire, and he has expectation, and I can’t live up to them, he must not want me near. I better stay far away. I better just get whatever enjoyment I can now, because if there is a God, I’d rather put off meeting him as long as I can.” The danger is to lose connection to God so much that when he actually comes you’d say to the mountains, “fall on me,” and the hills,” cover me;” but they won’t listen to you. So this is incredibly important to understand. Thankfully for us, the fire of Pentecost communicates more clearly the role of grace and mercy in how God interacts with us. It was there at Sinai, but it’s made clearer in the Pentecost fire. Why the gentle fire at Pentecost? God showed at Pentecost in the gentle fire that he wants to be close to us in a way that does not turn us to ash, but which warms and uplifts and fills with a renewed sense of meaning; which gives the skills needed to accomplish what we’re put here to accomplish. All that is present at Pentecost. But the first and deepest reason for the calmer, gentler fire of Pentecost has to go back to what happened 50 days prior. Jesus went to a hill, not Sinai, but Calvary. At Calvary the fiery judgment of his Father came down on him, and did to him what the Israelites had feared might happen to Moses; it consumed him. Turned his soul to ashes and his body to death. At Calvary, every act of rebellion that you and I have committed was put on Jesus. Every time you’ve acted better than others and thought, “God must have chosen me because I’m so good,” that’s offensive to God, and he put that offense on Jesus. Every time you’ve acted like God is so destructive that you’d be better off far away; Jesus was treated as far away. Every time you’ve acted like God is just too cruel to deal with; Jesus faced the despair that should have been yours. Jesus faced the fire so that the presence of God can now be still impactful, but far less frightening to you. Not only do you have the confidence that any atonement needed for your wrongs has already been made; you also have the confidence that after the fire consumed Jesus, he came back to life. Jesus’ ability to rise like a phoenix from the ashes and overcome the fire of judgment with the fire of his indestructible human life; that’s your confidence that you can endure when the heat is turned up in your life, that you also can rise from the ashes of death. Because of what Jesus had done only 50 days prior, the fire of Pentecost could be much different that the fire of Sinai. The fundamental way that you get to approach God, the consuming fire, is for Jesus to make you fireproof first. You are invited to approach God on the basis of who Jesus is and what he has done. Already close to God through him, you get to obey his law expectations as a result of the already granted acceptance. That’s why the Pentecost event and the Pentecost shift could happen. So, let’s consider some implications of that Pentecost event. What does it teach us about how God wants to interact with us? He wants to be both close and powerful in our lives as well. First, notice how the fire separated and rested on the followers of Jesus. God no longer wants his consuming fire to inhabit a mountain. He wants to live in people instead. He doesn’t want all that powerful fire to reside in one place; but instead to rest on many of his followers. It’s not just a special
class of priests and Levites in a temple anymore; but the Holy Spirit is given to all believers; we are a kingdom of priests in the New Testament time period. At Pentecost, Jesus sent the Holy Spirit and signaled a shift in the way he would choose to interact with people in the New Testament time period. No longer visible in this world, he has not left us alone; the Holy Spirit is in us and among us in a unique way. The transition from the Old to the New Testament is complete. The grace of God which has always been at the foundation of both the Old and the New testament, is made more explicitly clear for us New Testament believers. The Savior of the world has come; and so God doesn’t need a single earthly nation to be his special people on earth. Any believer from any nation is part of God’s special people, set aside to serve him. Second of all, at Pentecost the Holy Spirit gave miraculous new ability. The followers of Jesus spoke about him and people from all over the world heard their own language. A reversal of the tower of Babel happened. Without training or studying, those believers had new a new ability, they had the opportunity to speak to a large group. Another miracle is that they had the desire and willingness to speak. No longer afraid, running away from danger and locking the doors, they spoke in the same city that had killed Jesus only 50 days earlier, and they spoke without concern for their safety. Pentecost also means the Holy Spirit has a purpose for you to fulfill and a message for you to tell. Like wind and fire, the Holy Spirit desires to make an impact in you as well. If you look outside and not a leaf or a blade of grass is moving, you’d conclude that there is no wind. If you go into a room on a cold day, and it’s cold, you’d conclude there’s no fire. There should be some evidence of the moving influence of the Holy Spirit, the warming presence on your spirit. Now, the evidence is not always miraculous language speaking. It can be the gentle movement of a tree branch, or the warming of a room. Sometimes almost unnoticed unless you stop and really think about why the room is warm. The evidence of the Holy Spirit can be simple things like desiring what is good for others, doing whatever humble act you can to help. It can be the desire and willingness to share the message of Jesus life from the fire that gets spread around the world today. In addition to speaking the message yourself, you can support mission work and Bible translation, so that new languages hear the Pentecost also shows us some opposition to this message. Some said, “They’re drunk.” Maybe responding not only the fact that they could be understood in other languages; but the content of the message. They think a guy died and came back to life? They must be drunk. Some will write you off as well. So be prepared like Peter was, not only to explain yourself; but also to direct the conversation to what really matters. He didn’t get into an argument. He dismissed their ridicule and got back to talking about Jesus. Pentecost means that your New Testament mission is tied to your understanding of Scripture. Peter got up and quoted the prophet Joel, and it’s clear that he’s come to new understanding of what the writings of the prophets was really all about. They saw a Christ centered Bible, a Christ centered Old Testament. They started to understand prophets like Joel to be referring to parts of what Jesus alone could accomplish. The pieces fell into place for Peter and the others. You see this all throughout Acts, into the writings of Paul, Peter, John and others. Same is true for you. Because of the Holy Spirit’s presence in your life, you can come to have a Christ centered view of the Bible as well. Because you can really read the Bible only 1 of 2 ways. Either its all about him, or all about you. There’s a massive difference between these 2. If you think the Bible is really about you and how you need to live up to God’s standards, either you will struggle and be crushed, or get ignorantly proud and over inflated. But when you see the Bible as all about Jesus, pride is crushed and despair is lifted up. Jesus had to die, that’s how bad your sin is. He was willing to do it and able to rise; that’s how important and valued you are to God. Peter and the others got a Christ centered view of the Bible, you need it too.
The Holy Spirit invites you to spend time considering his Word, to ask him to help you see Jesus in all the Bible. He invites your worship, your prayer conversation with God. He wants you to come close to receive things like baptism and Lord’s Supper. Finally, Pentecost helps us deal with difficult events in our life, because it teaches us to expect God to interact with us on the basis of Jesus’ completed work of death and resurrection. It shows us that God wants to be close to us, and he has found a way in the sending of the Holy Spirit. So, what events in your life have you struggled to deal with? How can you allow Jesus’ victory over sin and death to re-color the way you view it? How can you remember the Holy Spirit’s presence even at the hardest moments. Because Jesus died and has risen, it means that your past is redeemed, made useful in some way. Your present is filled with the presence of the HS. With a purpose, with a message. Your future is this, one day Jesus will come, and all who call on the name of the Lord will be saved. Right now the fire of Jesus’ love, though you often fear it will burn you up, the more you let it into your life and my soul, the more it only burns up that which was worthless and damaging, and like purified metal leaves you more and more a reflection of the image of Christ you are meant to be. Pentecost means God is near, and you are made new. Amen.