Pentecost Sunday
Notes
Transcript
The Church was born at Pentecost, the modern Church as we know it came about because of the work of the Holy Spirit, the obedience of those in the upper room, it gave us the Church as we know it today. And in recognition of the importance of that event in Church history and in our lives today, we celebrate Pentecost
Of course, Pentecost has always been a holiday, A celebration of the harvest
For Israel, it was a harvest of grain
For the Church, Pentecost is a great harvest of the Spirit.
Because of Pentecost we reap a harvest, Power to be a witness, Ability to be renewed and transformed, Life in his presence. Because of Pentecost, His power is abundantly available to us that believe. We are a Pentecostal Church. Now I don’t mean that we are affiliated denominationally with the Pentecostal Church, those are titles and labels, and I don’t care to be locked in to a title or a label....what I DO mean is that we identify and seek after the fullness of the Spirit just as they did at Pentecost
I believe that we need a harvest of the Spirit of God in our lives once again. As witnesses we cannot afford to stop seeking to be filled with His power. As The church we cannot afford to remain the same, we need to be transformed. As His Children We cannot afford to ignore His immediate presence. We as a church need that Pentecostal power once again.
We Need the Holy Spirit Because We Need Power to Witness
We Need the Holy Spirit Because We Need Power to Witness
And while staying with them he ordered them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the promise of the Father, which, he said, “you heard from me;
But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.”
A lady went to a jeweler to have her watch fixed. He disappeared to the back and soon returned with it running perfectly.
Surprised, she asked how he could fix it so soon. He told her it only needed a new battery.
Battery? Battery? No body said anything about a battery. I’ve been winding it every morning!"
A lot of Christians do not realize the inner power of the Holy Spirit to handle things they think they must take into their own hands.
A. His power is available to US TO COMPLETE THE TASK BEFORE US IN THE HARVEST and he wants us to complete the task in his power and not by our ingenuity
You can see from our text that God did not dare ask His people to do His work without giving them the ability to do it.
This is why they were asked to wait in Jerusalem until power from on high descended upon them.
The message of Acts 1:8 is simple Apart from the Holy Spirit no-one can preach the Gospel as God wants them to do.
with the Holy Spirit we can make a difference
and my speech and my message were not in plausible words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, so that your faith might not rest in the wisdom of men but in the power of God.
Without the Power of the Holy Spirit the message of the Gospel rest in man’s wisdom
the Bible tells us in 2 Tim 3:5 that in the Last days the Church will have a "form of Godliness, but deny the power thereof"
That is a way of saying that we the Church will be putting more emphasis on externals [show] rather than on internals [empowerment by the Holy Spirit]
We need to be like The New Testament Church that saw the baptism of the Holy Spirit as the NORMAL experience for empowering believers to preach the Gospel
They knew as we should understand that without Him we Won’t make much of a difference in this world.
We Need the Holy Spirit Because We Need to be Transformed
We Need the Holy Spirit Because We Need to be Transformed
When the day of Pentecost arrived, they were all together in one place. And suddenly there came from heaven a sound like a mighty rushing wind, and it filled the entire house where they were sitting. And divided tongues as of fire appeared to them and rested on each one of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance.
Why WAS THERE A the symbol of fire when the believers received the Holy Spirit?
a. Fire is the symbol of transformation!
b. Fire changes whatever it touches.
Lets look at some ways the Holy Spirit works to Transform us
The Holy Spirit took a group of fisherman, ex-religious leaders, tax collectors, and various family members of Jesus and the other disciples
And formed them into a united group…we call the church
Before Pentecost....The disciples were scared, They lacked faith, They did not fully understand God’s plan
After Pentecostal fire fell however, They were united as never before.
Nothing earlier had welded them into one united force, not the trials they had been through, not the things they had accomplished....It took the fire of God’s Spirit to do this
Pieces of metal and a blacksmith forging
What makes the church work in our day? God’s Spirit
There has never been a program that has dramatically transformed people’s lives
Brought them from all walks of life, And turned them into a united group that can actually accomplish something.....It takes God’s Spirit to do that
the Church was birthed in the power of the Holy Spirit,
Society won’t be transformed until the Church is transformed by the power of the Holy Spirit.
We Need the Holy Spirit Because We Can’t Afford to Live Life Without His Presence
We Need the Holy Spirit Because We Can’t Afford to Live Life Without His Presence
“I baptize you with water for repentance, but he who is coming after me is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.
And divided tongues as of fire appeared to them and rested on each one of them.
The fire that appeared on the heads of each believer in the upper room has a connection to the Old Testament:
When Moses was dedicating the tabernacle,
And fire came out from before the Lord and consumed the burnt offering and the pieces of fat on the altar, and when all the people saw it, they shouted and fell on their faces.
And Solomon was Dedicating the temple
As soon as Solomon finished his prayer, fire came down from heaven and consumed the burnt offering and the sacrifices, and the glory of the Lord filled the temple.
When Solomon finished praying, fire came down from heaven and consumed the burnt offering and the sacrifices, and the glory of the Lord filled the temple.
supernatural fire from the presence of God fell on the sacrifices.
This indicated to the people that God had accepted the tabernacle and the Temple as His dwelling place
The proof of his acceptance was the supernatural fire that fell from heaven.
The Apostle Paul uses the term temple to indicate that under the New Covenant our bodies are the Temple" of the Holy Spirit
Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own,
At Pentecost, the individual believers had tongues of fire over them, Supernatural fire from heaven …
Once again God sent His own fire to demonstrate that from now on He would accept the "temple" – the individual as His dwelling place,
So that the believer is a "temple" of the Holy Spirit.
The Church - would now become the dwelling place of God’s Holy Spirit.
As the temple of the Holy Spirit 1 Cor. 6:19 tells us that we are not our own any longer, In fact what it is telling us is that we are not alone any longer either
even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, for he dwells with you and will be in you.
the Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept him, because it neither sees him nor knows him. But you know him, for he lives with you and will be in you.
I thank God for the presence of the Holy Spirit in my life, I thank god for that relationship, I thank God for that Power
I also know that unless I build and maintain my relationship I can easily have that relationship come to a halt
ILLUS:
One New Year’s Day, in the Tournament of Roses parade, a beautiful float suddenly sputtered and quit. It was out of gas. The whole parade was held up until someone could get a can of gas. The amusing thing was this float represented the Standard Oil Company. With its vast oil resources, its truck was out of gas.
Often, Christians neglect their spiritual maintenance, and though they are "clothed with power" (Luke 24:49) They find themselves out of gas.
In Leviticus 6:12 we see some instructions about the fire of God in the Temple
The fire on the altar shall be kept burning on it; it shall not go out. The priest shall burn wood on it every morning, and he shall arrange the burnt offering on it and shall burn on it the fat of the peace offerings.
instructions were given that the fire that fell from God should never be permitted to go out, it was to be attended constantly around the clock so it would never go out.
So should the fire of the Spirit of God in our lives, it should never be allowed to go out!
The people of God that are walking in the Spirit, Flowing in His gifts, Cherishing his presence, And stirring up the fire he has placed within us, Are going to make a difference in this world in these last days.