THE PREACHING OF PENTECOST
Acts 2:12-16 “Amazed and perplexed, they asked one another, ‘What does this mean?’ Some, however, made fun of them and said, ‘They have had too much wine.’ 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. These men are not drunk, as you suppose. It's only nine in the morning! No, this is what was spoken by the prophet Joel . . .’”
To understand Pentecost we have to turn to a man who was there and was the authorized inspired interpreter of what happened that day. We turn to the words of Peter as he explains to his fellow Jews and all the people who lived in Jerusalem the extraordinary events that they were witnessing, pleading with them, “Listen carefully to what I say,” (v.14). If men would do that then they would understand how and why the Spirit of God had come, and the implications for themselves and their relationship with God, but, alas, if they won’t listen to an apostle full of the Spirit of God speaking to them neither will they listen should one rise from the dead.
Immediately the Spirit of God comes upon the church then the people of God come under a scathing attack. The crowds in the temple had heard the disciples speaking in languages which had been unknown to them hitherto, and they were declaring the wonders of God. They have to find some explanation for this extraordinary miracle, and so they said, “They’ve been drinking. This gang of men has been on a binge and they’re drunk.” The devil always attacks the gospel church, and he is either scathing or he is subtle in his attack, but he will never ignore the church. Now there are noble sounding Christians who say that they never defend themselves from attack, and I agree that if it is merely our own names and reputations that are under fire then we are encouraged to respond by the Lord Jesus thus; “Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you” (Lk. 6:27 & 28). But when the Lord himself is being attacked then we are called to speak up for him and not be ashamed. When it is his truth that is being rubbished then we are set for the defence of the gospel. The New Testament is full of examples of our Lord and his apostles responding when, for example, they are accused of doing things by the power of Beelzebub, or teaching, “Let us sin that grace may abound.”. We have to explain what Christianity is and remove human prejudices, and then move into counter-attack.
The church has a right to be heard. If it is serving Beelzebub then it has forfeited that right. If it is drunk it has no right to be heard. If it is obscurantist and immoral then it has no right to be heard. If the church has a bad social record always siding against the ordinary people and supporting the land-owners and the aristocracy then it has lost its right to be heard. If the church is choking itself with puffed-upness and officialdom, choking itself with money, with ceremony and committee, with grandstanding and the trappings of power and pride then people are not going to listen to it and should not. If the church fills the newspapers with its summit conferences, and pronouncements and press releases and interviews for the benefit of journalistic wisdom, but has thus alienated itself from the masses it has lost the right to be heard.
But the early church was a humble group of people overwhelmed with what they had heard and seen the Lord Jesus doing and saying during those past three years. Now they had become the beneficiaries of what his Holy Spirit was doing in them and to them. Peter is their authorized spokesman and apologist. “These men are not drunk,” he says, “as you suppose. It’s only nine in the morning! No, this is what was spoken by the prophet Joel: ‘In the last days, God says, I will pour out my Spirit on all people . . .” (vv.15-17).
There were two choices being set before Jerusalem, the first explanation for what was happening was purely humanistic and natural, that these men had been knocking back strong drink, and that their babbling was merely the result of inebriation. Or there was the other end of the pendulum; God had poured out his Spirit on these men and everyone had to make up their unprejudiced minds about this choice; is the explanation alcohol or is it Joel? You are between a rock and a hard place. Maybe you are unwilling to rubbish so many fine men with the slander that they’d all together got drunk by 9 o’clock on a Sunday morning. They don’t look like the drunks you’ve seen in the past. However, you’re not yet willing to acknowledge that this is God at work, the third person of the Godhead, the Holy Spirit, who has come upon these men and filled them. Is there a middle way? Is there some nice way between these two extremes? I myself acknowledge that I am not neutral; I listen to what Peter says and I’ve been totally persuaded. He quotes, as we have seen, from Joel the prophet who predicted that such an event would occur; “This is that,” claims Peter. God promised to pour out his Spirit upon the church of the Messiah and on all its members. In other words you people of Jerusalem are on the spot when redemptive history is being made. You are eye-witnesses of this divine event. God is keeping his word; God is fulfilling his prophecies. You people who are students of Scripture know what Joel prophesied would happen one day, that it would be marked by three characteristics, and Peter says, “I want to prove to you, searchers of the word, that those different aspects of Joel’s prophecy have actually been fulfilled today.”
What did Joel say? “I will show wonders in the heaven above and signs on the earth below, blood and fire and billows of smoke. The sun will be turned to darkness and the moon to blood before the coming of the great and glorious day of the Lord” (vv. 19&20).
i] Wonders in the heaven above. When did this happen? Certainly it happened on Friday. Last Friday. You remember the sun was turned to darkness for hours at noon. The birds roosted and stopped singing. You needed to light your lamps to see your way about. This was not an eclipse because it lasted so long. The moon could be seen in the middle of the day, like a great drop of blood, red and angry in the middle of the sky. It happened when Jesus of Nazareth whom you condemned and executed was hanging on the cross. Wonders in heaven occurred, as well as signs on the earth too. There was the great earthquake; the rocks were shattered and the dead rose and some of you actually saw those people in Jerusalem. Signs on the earth and wonders in the heaven at the time of the bloody death of Christ where those dying men were guarded by the soldiers standing around their fire pot as it grew cold without the heat of the sun – “fire and billows of smoke”. You saw it on Golgotha where they crucified three men on Friday with Jesus of Nazareth in the midst of them. That’s all you’ve talked about in the past days. “They killed him . . . they crucified Jesus.”
Were these wonders unique? Were you surprised? Had there been nothing like that before? Was it just that Friday seven weeks ago that there were wonders in the heavens above and signs on the earth below? No. For the past three years Galilee and Judah and Jerusalem has been overwhelmed by them, and before that. When he was born in Bethlehem an extraordinary star appeared in the sky it came from the east and led some magi all the way from Babylon to the place the young child Jesus could be found. Wonders in heaven above. Then when he was baptized by John in the river Jordan mean heard the voice of God from heaven speaking, “This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased.” Then throughout his life wonders in the heavens above. He was on Galilee in a storm and the boat looked as if it would sink, but he spoke a word and the winds and waves obeyed him and there was a great peace. What manner of man is this that even the winds and the waves obey him? Wonders in heaven above!
ii] Then there were signs on the earth beneath. He went to a wedding in Cana of Galilee and he turned the water in the water pots into good mature wine. He later fed 5000 men by multiplying five loaves and two fishes. He delivered many people from demonic possession – haven’t you heard what he did for the former demoniac of the Gadarenes? He healed thousands of people; he failed to heal none. Not one person went away from Jesus as sick as he had come to him, not one. You all know personally friends or members of your family whose health has been totally recovered by going to Jesus. They didn’t have to go twice, and that fact became so common that you hardly considered it – “Go and see Jesus of Nazareth.” There are villages all over Galilee where he obliterated disease entirely. Now who’s the healer you are going to visit? There were some who had even tasted death . . . Jairus’ daughter, and Jesus took her hand and said to her, “Little girl arise,” and she came to life again. Check it out; the family are willing to speak now. There is the widow who lives in Nain with her son. The boy died and they were taking his body to be buried when Jesus came by and raised him from the dead. Check it out. There is the family in Bethany, some of your know them, Mary, Martha and their brother, Lazarus. He grew ill and Jesus deliberately didn’t come to heal him and he also died. He was buried in a sepulchre when the Lord arrived, but Jesus shouted out, “Lazarus come forth,” and the dead brother came out of the tomb, to stand with his arms around his sisters again and he is there today in Bethany. Check it out. What sort of man is this who can raise the dead? Joel said that before the great day when the Lord would pour out his Spirit on all kinds of people there would be wonders and signs in heaven and on earth. Hasn’t this been happening all around you? These things weren’t done in a corner, and now there is this, the howling of a hurricane here in Jerusalem. You have never heard the wind screaming as it’s done this morning, and the cloven tongues of fire resting on these men, and the gift of languages proclaiming how great God is. Wonders in heaven above and signs on the earth below, the day of extraordinary events. That is what Joel said would occur on this day.
“The sun will be turned to darkness and the moon to blood before the great and glorious day of the Lord” (v.20). What day is this? It is the Lord Jesus’ great and glorious day. Why is it great and glorious? Because he is great and glorious.
i] Great as a teacher. Haven’t you heard his parables? Don’t you know the parable of the prodigal son? Haven’t you understood that it tells us of the wonderful forgiveness and mercy of God to those who’ve treated God in such terrible ways? It says that the Father will welcome returning prodigals to himself and take them into his family even though they’ve behaved so shamefully towards him. Then, Jerusalem sinners, killers of the prophets and in these last days of God’s Son, there is hope for you! Again, haven’t you heard the parable of the sower, and doesn’t that explain why you listened to him for a while but quickly gave up? You are those stony ground hearers who were enthusiastic for weeks but then lost interest, more interested in materialism than God.
Again, haven’t you mulled over the Sermon on the Mount? Hasn’t that sermon spread like wild fire all over the land? Wasn’t that what people talked about for months? What extraordinary teaching, with such authority. Never man spake like this man. Jesus of Nazareth has dominated the land these past three years. Who talks about what the rabbis say in the synagogues? No one pays them the least attention, but the teaching of Jesus is on everyone’s lips, the men at the city gates in the evening, the women as they draw water at the well, even the children are quoting his words and his stories like the story of the two men building two houses. This time has been the great and glorious day of the Lord.
ii] Great as the Lamb of God. And we crucified him . . . our Sanhedrin and our chief priests bribed men to say he was a blasphemer. Think of it, Jesus a blasphemer! We handed this prophet over to the Romans and pressurized a very uneasy Pilate into crucifying him. Jesus had given life to many, and gone about doing good, and yet you yelled “Crucify him! Crucify him!” You hated the Lord and nailed him to a cross. Think of it, what horror! But do you know that he prayed for them while they crucified him? It was so typical of him. He loved his pain inflicting neighbours as his pain inflicted self. He prayed that his Father would forgive them because they didn’t know what they were doing. Think of it! Who could be such a man?
But his death was not an accident; he was not another failed prophet; it was not that again evil had triumphed over good. He was delivered up to that death “by God’s set purpose and foreknowledge” (v.23). Isaiah your great prophet said, “It pleased the Lord to bruise him; he is the one who has put him to grief.” God was doing it, and he was doing it in order to redeem us from our sins. You know that Scripture says that without the shedding of blood there is no remission of sins. You know that the blood of animals - bulls and goats and pigeons - can’t possibly atone for our wickedness. Then why did God require it? They were required during our infantile state; they were teaching aids and prophecies and types when we were like children. They were all pointing forward to the Messiah who would come and bruise the serpent’s head. Live by faith in the coming one! When Jesus’ forerunner came he said this about Christ, “Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.” That is why God delivered him up to the cross. His enemies were merely doing what was essential for redemption to be accomplished. Good Friday was the Lord’s as much as Easter Sunday was the Lord’s; he was Lord of the cross and the empty tomb.
iii] Great as the conqueror of death. “How do you know all this?” you ask. “You make all these claims, but where’s the proof?” Give us some hard-nosed facts that prove to us that Jesus is the Lord. Peter replies, “God raised him from the dead, freeing him from the agony of death, because it was impossible for death to keep its hold on him” (v.24). Have you ever seen that? A body dead in its coffin for three days, and then suddenly opening its eyes and mouth and saying, “That’s long enough,” and pulling himself up and walking off? Jesus did that. He raised himself on the third day according to the Scriptures. The significance of the resurrection is that it didn’t take place in the realm of theology, or ideas, or philosophy but in space and time, here on this planet, where Peter saw alive again the one he had denied and heard him challenge him, “Do you love me, Peter? Then feed my sheep.” All of this happened fifty days before Peter was preaching at Pentecost. The preacher of the Sermon on the Mount was officially dead; he was taken down from the cross; he was buried and his tomb was sealed and guarded. “But God raised him from the dead,” (v.24). There it is so categorical and simple, six words of one syllable, and that is the entire and wholly satisfactory explanation of what happened to the body of Jesus. The mighty Creator and sustainer of the universe did something, the one who had raised the widow’s son in the time of Elisha, the one who had given Job confidence to cry, “I know that my Redeemer liveth,” the one who had raised Jairus’ daughter and the widow of Nain’s son and Lazarus he also raised himself. It was unthinkable that death should keep him in his grip. Peter says it; “it was impossible for death to keep its hold of him” (v.24). Here is death entering the lists, and, competing against death, is Omnipotence, the God with whom nothing is impossible. Who is going to be the winner? Which is stronger? There can only be one. It is God. Peter says, “God has raised the Jesus to life, and we are witnesses of the fact” (v.32).
If just one person had said to you, “I’ve seen a ghost,” one person, then you’d be right to be cynical and say, “Pull the other leg,” or believe there was another explanation, but Peter could say that it was not just me that saw Jesus, 500 of us met with him on one occasion. Where have 500 people together ever seen a ghost? We spent almost six weeks with him after his resurrection. We were there on the first day of the week when we went to the grave. The stone was rolled away; the graveclothes were there but he wasn’t, and the guard were sleeping like men in a coma. Then Jesus began to visit us, the women in the garden, all the apostles in the upper Room, Peter by himself, two of our friends on the road to Emmaus – go and talk to Cleopas, check it out. It wasn’t a ghost; we ate and drank with him in the Upper Room and again when he cooked us breakfast by the lakeside – fish and bread. Ghosts don’t eat a meal with their friends. We all gathered to meet him, 500 of us, the women and children too, and he spent hours talking to us. Ask them yourselves. We saw him on the hill of ascension and then he blessed us and left. He is “Exalted to the right hand of God; he has received from the father the promised Holy Spirit and has poured out what you now see and hear” (v.33). This is the Lord’s own great and glorious day again.
iv] Great as the fulfiller of prophecy. You should all have been ready for this because King David spoke of him as well as Joel. “David said about him: “‘I saw the Lord always before me. Because he is at my right hand, I will not be shaken. Therefore my heart is glad and my tongue rejoices; my body also will live in hope, because you will not abandon me to the grave, nor will you let your Holy One see decay. You have made known to me the paths of life; you will fill me with joy in your presence’” (vv.25-28). Do you see what David called him? He called him ‘Lord’; David called Jesus ‘Jehovah.’ When David said that God would not abandon him in the grave he wasn’t speaking of himself because King David is dead and buried and we know where his grave is, and we can visit it. David was speaking of another who would not decay in the grave but who rise and walk the paths of life. That is exactly what happened, just as Scripture said, and we have seen him and talked to him and touched him on many occasions. Each one of us here praising God in these Gentile languages has spent time with him during the last fifty days. We can no more doubt that he is alive than that we are alive.
You say, “Well where is he? Bring him to us! Show us this risen Jesus and we will believe” . . . Bring him to you? . . . Bring him! . . . Us bring him? Do you know who you are talking about? Can we summon a whale out in the sea and bring him onto the beach? Can we make a wild eagle fly down from heaven at our beck and call? Bring the Son of God here? You err because you don’t know the Scriptures. Listen to what David said, “The Lord said to my Lord: ‘Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet’” (v.35). The one David called ‘My Lord’ is the Messiah. It is this Jesus who rose from the dead and he is now ascended and seated at the right hand of God. Here are some of the most moving words in all of Peter’s speech; “God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Christ” (v.36). What a claim! Jesus will leave that throne at the end of the age when he comes again to judge the living and the dead. We must all appear before his throne. I am telling you that this is his great and glorious day because he is great as a teacher, great as the Lamb of God, great as the resurrection and the life, great as the one who fulfills prophecy.
What did Joel say when he spoke about this great day? “And everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved” (v.21). Just think of everything people do to save themselves from a humdrum life. They read, and go to concerts, and travel, have a hobby and listen to music, and so on. Think of everything people do to save themselves from a lonely life. They get married or have relationships or join clubs with people of similar interests. Think of some things that people do to save themselves from an unhappy life. They read Mills and Boon, they drink or smoke or watch TV constantly or they even take drugs. Everyone does ‘stuff’ to save themselves from despair. What do people do to save themselves from guilt? Don’t you have guilt because of the people you’ve hurt? There is no one here who hasn’t hurt someone else. How are you dealing with it? You confess; you apologize; you seek to make restitution; good; I hope so. God help you, but what of the guilt of having done that deed? What is going to save you from those dark paths, those memories, your own culpability for your actions? Is there anything?
Here were people who had shouted out in mob rage, “Kill him! Crucify him!” and they succeeded. That man Jesus was wholly innocent. He had never hurt one of them but rather had helped thousands, and yet they hated him and they wanted him dead. But he was not merely the best of men, harmless and very loving, he was the Son of God. He was the word made flesh; he was the brightness of God’s glory and the express image of his person. If you want to know what God is like then you couldn’t do better than to examine the life of Jesus. Some of you imagine God to be an old man and that’s all right, but here is a better picture of God, a man who kneels on the floor with a bowl of water and a towel and he washes the donkey dung and street filth from the feet of twelve men one by one. God is loving like that. But you hated him and wanted him dead and you succeeded.
What can save you from that guilt? The blood of Jesus is on your hands. Peter tells them, “Call on the name of the Lord.” Here is a Lord with a name, and it is a name above every name. It is the name of Jehovah Jesus. You must call on that name exclusively. How fascinating that Peter does not say, “God is calling on you, so please say yes.” It is not that. The Lord says, “You have to do something. You have to see you need to be saved from the guilt of sin all known by me. You must call on my name, no one else’s but mine alone. Put in your application with the Lord and he will graciously accept. He will save.”
That was what happened on the Day of Pentecost. There was the sound of the rushing mighty wind, cloven tongues as of fire rested upon each disciple and they all spoke fluently in new languages that the people on pilgrimage from around the world could understand. Then some people said they were all drunk, but then Peter got up and spoke to them all and said that this was the day long prophesied of extraordinary events; this was the great and glorious day of the Lord Jesus, and this was the day of salvation. You are there in Jerusalem watching and hearing all of this, and when it is all over and the crowds break up then you walk off home to your wife and children. You tell them all that you have seen that day in Jerusalem, and they’re all cross at missing it. “Anyway,” you say, “I saw Jerusalem TV recording the whole incident and soon it will be on the evening news. Let’s switch on and watch it.” “By the way, who do you think was right? Were they really drunk, or is Jesus really the Messiah? I myself think he’s the Messiah. I vote for Peter.” “Well, my opinion is that they were drunk,” says your wife, “So I vote for the others.” So you call the kids and you all sit around the TV set to see the report. “Now kids,” you say, “Your Mom and I have had an argument about these strange things going on in Jerusalem today. I think that one thing caused it but your mother thinks another. Let’s watch this . . .” and so you all watch it and then it’s reporter Esther in the street outside the temple ending her report and we are going back to Ruth in the studio, “Good night Esther.” “Good night Ruth.” You switch it off and ask the kids their opinions and you all vote again, but then it’s bedtime and you make them some porridge and finally go to sleep.
Is that how it was as Pentecost came to an end in Jerusalem? Did they decide who had the better case? Who had the upper hand? Was it a debate? Was it a primitive form of the Oxford Union? Did some people say, “Well, what Peter said makes sense to me,” and others decided they were all a bunch of fanatics? Half voted for the alcohol and half voted for Peter and they all went home to bed? Not at all. Peter did not give them a single gram of opportunity to think that they were the jury and he and the 120 were on trial. The Christians were not under judgment. The people of Jerusalem were in the dock. Peter began with Joel’s prophesy and then he went on to David’s psalm and he showed them how great Christ was in fulfilling all the Joel and David had said about this long promised day. Then he said to them, You, some of you absolutely literally, and all of you with the help of wicked men (with whom you had every sympathy), you “put him to death by nailing him to the cross” (v.23). You have killed the only begotten Son of God. You ended the life of Jehovah Jesus. That is what you have done, and now I am telling you that “God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Christ” (v.26). You murdered him, but do you know where he is now? He is at the right hand of God. In other words, he is waiting for you; you are going to meet him; you are going to see him; he’s your Judge and you can’t avoid him. This is an appointment you cannot miss. That is what Peter said.
A minister friend of mine named Henry was witnessing to a man for three months and was getting nowhere, and so he set out to see him in his home. There were a disreputable group of men sitting in the front room but he walked past them to the bedroom where the man was lying down. Henry said to me, “I never laid it on anyone the way I laid it on him then.” He was startled and finally answered, “Are you trying to tell me that I am some kind of sinner?” Henry replied, “That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you over the past three months.” “Oh,” he muttered. “I had talked with him on many occasions, and he had enjoyed them all. It had been a debate and it came nowhere nearer trusting in Christ.” The next Sunday I saw him in the congregation. I was preaching on the fourth commandment, and I said to the church, “Don’t think you have any hunger for God if you come to church only on Sunday mornings.” He shrank down in the pew because he had made up his mind that from this time on he was going to come to church Sunday mornings, but the first time he turned up he learned that that was not acceptable. He came for the next months and both he and his wife were converted, and they now raise their children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord, but before that time I was just debating with him.
The crowds of Jerusalem began by thinking that they were in the jury box having to decide between men being filled with the Spirit or being filled with wine. No, Peter says, you are in the dock, and the Judge of all the earth has passed sentence on you, “You put my Son to death by nailing him to the cross.” God has found you guilty of deicide. Nobody left Jerusalem that day thinking it was an interesting speech that they had heard. No one said to Peter or about Peter’s preaching, “What a grand application of history of redemption passages. All sermons should be like that.” Peter didn’t ask for their opinion and verdict. What did he say? How did his sermon end? “Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins . . . With many other words he warned them; and he pleaded with them, ‘Save yourselves from this corrupt generation’” (vv. 38, 40). Peter asked them to call on the name of the Lord, that is, for their repentance for what they had done, that they turned right around and worshiped the one they’d killed. Peter told them their sins needed forgiveness in Jesus’ name. Peter warned them of the folly of ignoring what they had seen and heard in those days in Jerusalem in Galilee. Peter told them they needed to be saved, and he pleaded with them to be saved.
That sermon transformed 3,000 men because it had cut them to the heart (v.37). They knew what Peter said was true; every single word was true and so they had to do something about it. That is the only reason anyone should become a Christian - because it is true. They had a meeting with the one who is their judge. They knew they were guilty, that Christ was the promised Messiah, the Saviour, the Lord, and they had killed him, and now they were headed for an open-ended encounter with him, and nothing was going to prevent that happening. They were getting nearer and nearer the wrath of the Lamb and they were heading for this collision as terribly guilty people. What could they do? How could they be forgiven? These people were the most religious people in the whole world. They were the most moral people in the world. They had traveled there on pilgrimage from countries hundreds of miles away to worship the Lord their God. Then they learn when they get there that they are murderers; their works would not save them; their pilgrimages would not save them. God must save and he alone.
Peter wouldn’t let them go with a fascinating experience and a stimulating sermon that they all admired. The Spirit was leading Peter into all truth. He had given Peter the sword of the Spirit which is the Word of God, and he wasn’t putting on a juggling act for them to entertain them by some display! Peter took the sword and he cut them to their hearts again and again and he refused to stop thrusting it into them while they were rejecting his Saviour. There’d be no hope for them merely admiring ‘the young Galilean fisherman’s eloquence.’ He warned them about staying away from Christ one minute longer. Peter didn’t stand up in Jerusalem and ‘share’ his own experience with them. He didn’t say, “Let me tell you what it is like to be filled with the Spirit.” He didn’t tell them what having cloven tongues as of fire resting upon him felt like. The thought never entered his mind. He never mentioned himself. He never said ‘I’. He spoke of the Christ that had been crucified who now was ascended with power and glory and given the right to send forth the Holy Spirit. Three thousand men were cut to their hearts because they weren’t ready to meet God, and in that state they weren’t fit to live and they weren’t fit to die. “Repent and be baptized,” said Peter. “Save yourselves from this corrupt generation.” Go away with those words ringing in your ears, and don’t forget them until you’ve done what they say.
10th August 2008 GEOFF THOMAS