Acts 2:32-39. This sermon was preached by Pastor Marty Bonner on June 4, 2017.
Today we remember and celebrate the momentous event, almost 2,000 years ago, in which the promise of the Holy Spirit was fulfilled in Jerusalem during the Feast of Weeks or Pentecost. Though the Holy Spirit had been active throughout the Old Testament times, the prophets pointed forward to a time when God would pour out His Spirit upon all His people, to be with them and enable them for all of life, not just certain events.
We should also notice that God chose a feast that celebrated the harvest as the day for pouring out His Spirit. Thus, it pictures the great harvest of people, throughout every generation, who have become desirable to God by repenting of their sins and believing on Jesus as their savior and lord. It also recognizes our need for the Holy Spirit in order to bring this harvest in. When the Holy Spirit came upon those 120 disciples who were gathered in Jerusalem, they began to speak in other languages that they did not know. However, other people who had gathered for the feast from all around the world recognized that they were praising God and speaking about His wonderful deeds. This opens the door for a great harvest of 3,000 individuals who put their faith in Jesus that day as the Apostle Peter stood up and addressed the crowd.
The crowd was asking, “What does this mean?” For the sake of time we will pick up half way through Peter’s answer. Basically Peter explains that they are seeing the fulfillment of God’s promise of the Holy Spirit.
Before verse 32, Peter had quoted from Psalm 16, a Psalm of David. In this psalm David prophesies that the Father will not leave His Holy One in the grave to decay, but instead he will be resurrected. It is easy to read this and think that David is speaking of himself. However, Peter makes the point that David is speaking of the Messiah who would come from His lineage. It was Jesus who had fulfilled this prophecy. Now it is not every day that specific prophecies are fulfilled. People had been hearing conflicting reports from some that Jesus had been resurrected, and from others that the disciples had stolen the body while the guards were asleep. Peter stands up and publicly declares the truth about Jesus. He had been raised up by God from death, and the 120 who were experiencing the baptism of the Holy Spirit were all witnesses of this. It is worth noting that there were at least 500 witnesses of the resurrection of Jesus within the early church. Over the course of 40 days following his burial, at a variety of places, and for extended periods of time, Jesus appeared to His disciples. This was no hallucination or a made up story. They witnessed it with their own eyes and felt him with their own hands. So we have human witness to the resurrection of Jesus. We also have a heavenly witness to the veracity of these claims in the amazing events that the crowd is seeing. These Galileans, who did not know languages from around the world, were miraculously speaking the wonders of God in the midst of Jerusalem. Of course this is not the end of it. The book of The Acts of the Apostles could also be called The Acts of the Holy Spirit through the Disciples of Jesus. They would see miracles and powerful presentations of the Gospel by people who were not special by man’s determination. This is precisely what the coming of the Holy Spirit was all about. No longer would it be certain special people who would be used by the Spirit. Now it would be all of God’s people, most of which were not anything spectacular by the world’s standards.
Next Peter states that this Jesus was exalted to the right hand of God. Now the disciples did not see Jesus physically being resurrected. But they did see him after the event. They saw the effects of it. In this case it is the opposite. They had seen Jesus ascend in front of their eyes into the sky until a cloud obscured their sight. Here they see the event, but not necessarily the effect of that ascension, which is Jesus sitting at the right hand of the Father. However, they are taking what they have seen, and adding to it what Jesus told them and what the prophets prophesied, and then trusting that what they can’t see has happened. In fact the outpouring of the Holy Spirit is intended to be proof that Jesus had been accepted in heaven and now had all power and authority at his disposal. Notice that it is Jesus who has received the promise of the Holy Spirit and it is he who pours it out on his disciples. This is important for us to recognize. Technically all of the blessings of God are given to Jesus. He alone has merited the favor and blessings of God. However, Christ shares this with those who belong to Him. Thus all the blessings of heaven are available to those who are in relationship with Jesus.
Verses 34 and 35 are quoting Psalm 110 verse 1. Here David is speaking of his lord being seated at the right hand of God. He is basically saying, “The LORD (The Father) said to my lord (master) sit at My right hand until I make your enemies your footstool.” Thus Jesus is the Son of David by birth, but even David recognized the Messiah as his lord, or master, because of his divinity. Now the verse also gives us a terminus or end point for this situation. Jesus will be at the right had of the Father until his enemies are subdued beneath his feet. This does not mean that God has been trying to subdue the enemies of Jesus for 2,000 years and somehow can’t quite get the job done. What has the Father been doing for 2,000 years? He has been offering terms of peace to the enemies of Jesus. The grace of God made possible through the sacrifice of Jesus is offered to those who do not deserve it. By the Holy Spirit the call goes out to the whole world, “Stop being a foe of Jesus and become a friend!” All that said, this time of Grace will come to an end in an event referred to as “I [will] make your enemies your footstool.” The Second Coming of Christ is the Father bringing the time of grace to an end as well as Jesus’ residence in the heavens. At that point forward Jesus will dwell on earth with His Saints. Today is the day of salvation, and the day of the Grace of God. Seize it now, for the window of opportunity will not stay open forever.
So we see the pouring out of the Holy Spirit as God enabling the disciples of Jesus to be led by and empowered by the Spirit in order to be witnesses to the world and bring in a harvest of individuals who become believers in Jesus.
Verse 36 concludes the matter. The leaders and people of Israel had crucified Jesus. Yes, the Romans were involved, but they would have never done it without the pressure put on them by the Israelite leaders. Yet, God disagreed with this rejection. They killed Jesus, but God raised Him up and made Him both Lord and Christ. We need to recognize today that there are two different things: what man is doing, and what God is doing. We want to be a part of what God is doing because it will last and we will be blessed. This reality puts them in a position of being an adversary to God and His work. And, though we were not there to crucify Jesus, our flesh is just as hostile to God and His work. This world actively rejects and fights against the work of the Holy Spirit in the followers of Jesus. We have a choice to make. We can trust in man and throw our lot in with them, or we can trust in God and throw our lot in with Jesus.
This conclusion cuts to the heart of many of the people there that day. They were shocked by what Peter was saying. The Old Testament was littered with the stories of those who resisted God and were destroyed because of it. “What shall we do?” Even today, we often go about our lives with all kinds of reasons why we are okay. But the Word of God in the mouth of a Spirit empowered Christian can cut through all of that and raise the question, “What can I do?”
Before we let Peter answer that question, I want to spend a few moments talking about the spiritual work of conviction. “Cut to the heart,” is a picture of the conviction of the Holy Spirit. He is enabling them to understand their true condition before God. On one hand there is fear as we recognize the reality of our sin and its consequences. However, on the other hand there is hope because only God can open our eyes to our sin, and He does so in order to lead us to salvation. It is easy when you feel conviction to accuse the other person of condemning you. Condemnation can occur when we tell people they are lost without the second part of the message, the hope there is in Jesus. Conviction feels as bad as condemnation, but it offers a door of hope for us to walk through. It cuts through all the personal and cultural baggage that keeps the truth from reaching our heart. This is a scary moment, but it is also a wonderful moment. Conviction is a spring of life to a person stumbling in the desert. There is a powerful picture here. Before the Holy Spirit, Peter tried to help Jesus by using a literal sword to hack off the ear of one of the enemies of Jesus. There was no life and no hope in such an action. You could even say that his actions would affect the ability of that man to hear the truth about Jesus later (he damaged his ear). In healing the ear, Jesus is telling Peter that there is another way. Now in this episode we see Peter helping Jesus by using the Sword of the Spirit (God’s Word) in order to cut to the heart of his enemies and leading over 3,000 of them to become his disciples. The Spirit doesn’t just empower us. He redirects us in a path that can actually help people.
Now let’s look at Peter’s answer to the question, “What shall we do?” Peter tells them to repent of their sins and be baptized in the name of Jesus. To repent is to turn away from those sins and involves agreeing with what God calls sin. To be baptized in his name is a purposeful and public declaration of a switching of allegiance. The effect of these actions is to have our sins remitted by God. Now the medical community uses the word “remission” for both permanent and temporary absence of disease. So it could be easy to think that the “remission of your sins” might only be temporary. But the word being translated does not have a sense of it being temporary. There is another word that is used of the Old Testament era people. Their sins were laid aside in order to be dealt with later. That word had a sense that the sins were completely dealt with yet. But this word means a separation between us and our sin, which also means that there is no longer any punishment. So being in a state of repentance, identification with Jesus, and sins removed, they are told to then receive the Holy Spirit. Of course receive is passive and active at the same time. Jesus is the one who actively gives us the Holy Spirit. However, we need to look for Him and cooperate with Him. He takes up residence within all who put their trust in Jesus. But, He also wants to fill us completely with Himself, which will direct and empower us with spiritual gifts. This was not just for the first century. Peter states that it is for all whom God calls to salvation. Jesus is still calling people to salvation today, and thus He is still pouring out the Holy Spirit upon those who res pond in faith. Let’s not settle just to be saved and have the Spirit within us. He is seeking to do so much more in and through us. Take time to wait upon the Lord in prayer, each and every day, asking Him to fill your life with His Spirit. Let Him become your direction and power.