This was Pentecost. It was also known as the Feast
of Weeks. Now the Feast of weeks was a
celebration of the completion of harvest and the keyword
completion of harvest. And so I find it interesting
that the Holy Spirit is chosen by God to descend at the
completion of his work on the cross and also the completion of
what was promised in chapter 1. Flip to chapter 1.
We're going to look at verse 4 and 5 S Acts chapter one, verse
four and five. And we'll read that together.
I'm reading from the new King James.
And being assembled together with them, He commanded them not
to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the promise of the
Father, which he said, you have heard from me for John truly
baptised with water, but you shall be baptised with the Holy
Spirit not too many days from now.
So that's the context of Jesus telling his disciples to wait.
Now back to our text in Acts chapter 2, we read the first 4
verses. Acts chapter 2, when the day of
Pentecost had fully come, they were all with 1 accord in one
place, and suddenly there came a sound from heaven.
I've underlined suddenly in my Bible and I'll tell you why in a
little bit. There came a sound from heaven
as of I've underlined that as well.
A rushing mighty wind and it filled the whole house where
they were sitting. Then there appeared to them
divided tongues as of fire, and one sat on each of them and they
were all filled verse four with the Holy Spirit and began to
speak with other tongues as a spirit gave them utterance.
Couple of things, like I said, underlined verse 2 suddenly as
of and I've got all sorts of underlines there because it's
things that jumped out to me. First one I want to look at is
the word sudden in verse 2 sudden.
I looked it up in the original means unexpected suddenly, and
this tells me it emphasises that the arrival of the Spirit was as
we read in chapter 1 was expected, but it also caught
them by surprise. Why is that important?
For me, it really highlights the fact that these guys weren't,
and maybe this is familiar for some of you who've been around
church culture for a while. They weren't holding a tarrying
service. Anybody heard of that before?
A tarrying service? Yep, there we go.
I remember that as a kid in our denomination that we grew up in,
it's a tarrying service was just waiting for the Holy Spirit to
fall as if by our waiting the Holy Spirit would come or they
weren't even holding an afterglow service.
And I know that's something that's familiar to use.
An afterglow service, for those who don't know, is basically
just where you have some songs pretty good on retreats and
camps. You have some songs you sing and
you just give some time and space for the Holy Spirit and
the gifts to work. They weren't even having that.
They weren't having any type of service that was geared to bring
heaven down or to set an atmosphere because that's how
the modern church would do it. We would get chairs set up in a
circle like tonight. You walk in and everything's
different. The lights are low.
We'll maybe even move this carpet out into the middle.
We'll have everybody in the worship team maybe sitting down
on chairs, maybe a bit of smoke. If you're lucky, the worship
leader might even have his shoes off then and that, but that's
probably not that unfamiliar. And everybody walks in and goes.
Things are different and things are going to be cool.
And that's how we do it is we try to manufacture a intimate
lighting, an atmosphere where perhaps by somehow with our
actions or with what we do with our lighting, with our smoke,
with our shoes off, with our worship team on guitars.
Let's do an unplugged version Is we have manufactured an area
where the Holy Spirit will actually come Now, like we've
prepped, like something we have done would actually bring the
Holy Spirit down. That's wrong.
I think that's wrong. And I was speaking to somebody
in the church. I won't point out who it is, but
I was speaking to somebody in the church a little bit ago,
just a couple of weeks in regards to this.
And we were talking about how as a worship leader, music is so
powerful. Anybody watched any movies when
the audio isn't working? Suddenly those movies become
quite eerie. I find every movie, even the
funniest movies when there is no audio to it becomes like a
spooky movie. Power of soundtrack, power of
score, and that behind is able to manipulate emotion.
And as a worship leader for since the age of 17, I've found
that I have the ability with picking songs and arranging
certain things that I actually had the ability to manipulate
emotional response from people. And that's really sad.
And I had to deal with that myself is through the crescendo
of our band and the crescendo of hitting the right moment or
pausing at the right moment, I was able to elicit a response
from people. And for that, as I sang, I'm
sorry Lord, because it's powerful.
Music is powerful. There is a guy on YouTube which
you can watch and it's, I wouldn't say you you should
watch it, but there's a non Christian response to listening
to Oceans. Anybody seen that clip?
Have you seen that? It's got millions of views.
It's like over 2 million views. And so it's this non Christian
who sits there and just watches Christian music and he cries and
it's people watching that for 2 million people.
So a music has the power to move somebody with just that.
He's not saved, he's just been moved by the music.
As I said, I think this is wrong.
The word sudden tells me that it was not because of anything that
these people were doing, but rather that it was exactly as
God promised and perfect timing of God.
So if they weren't having a tarrying service, if they
weren't having an afterglow service, if they weren't doing
something that was manufacturing the Holy Spirit to come down,
what were they doing? First one, when the day of
Pentecost had fully come, they were all with 1 accord in one
place. That's all we're given.
And then verse 2 tells us a little bit more detail.
It says, and suddenly there came a sound from heaven as of a
rushing mighty wind, and it filled the whole house.
Here's the posture. What were they doing?
They were sitting kind of like tonight.
They were just sitting. It doesn't tell us that they
were doing anything amazing or anything wonderful.
They were just sitting, and then the Holy Spirit came.
A posture. Sitting is a posture of
obedience. And I commend you guys tonight
because you're here on a pretty stormy night and you are doing
exactly that. You are sitting in the presence
of the Lord, obediently showing up when God has instructed us to
come and do not forsake the assembling together.
So big deal. They are obedient.
They're waiting. Then what we read it in verse 2,
it says the sound as of and I want that particularly because
it's not rushing wind. It says as of rushing wind.
It's not wind. Specifically, the author of our
text who is Doctor Luke, one of the disciples, he uses a
metaphor to describe something that has no earthly description.
How do you describe something that is divine using earthly
words? So he goes, it sounded like
wind. It's not wind because notice the
wind or the sound of the wind filled the whole house.
Now I've been, we live in Secret Harbour.
I've been in some stormy places where it is wind, but I've never
had the wind fill the whole house.
The wind that I've had on a stormy day that has come in
through, you know what it did, It busted through my front door
and pushed up through the manhole.
It's trying to find a point of entry and then a point of exit.
It doesn't fill or envelope the whole house.
Verse 3 says it's tongues as of fire.
Again, not fire, but as of fire again.
How do you describe tongues of fire?
We made those with the kids the other day in Sunday school.
We had the little headbands and they had the tongues of fire in
there. But again, Luke is trying to
explain something here. There's what appears to be
divided tongues of fire, but it doesn't say it is fire.
It says as of fire. But another thing there I want
you to notice in that verse 3 or read that this has then appeared
to them. Divided tongues as of fire.
Notice this. And one sat upon each of them,
upon each of them. In Acts 115.
It tells us how many were in the room.
I'll flip over to there for you. It says, and in those days Peter
stood up in the midst of the disciples all together the
number of names was about 120. Why is this important?
Because it wasn't just for the apostles.
There were 120 in the room and it sat upon each one of them.
A critical thing in there as well, which I picked up is not
only did it sit upon each person near the 420, but it was
everyone in the room. Everyone in the room.
And I think, sadly, we miss out on so much of what God has for
us because we simply not found in the room or we are not found
in the place where God has asked us to be.
So, so far we've seen these guys were just sitting.
They were obediently waiting in Jerusalem, not doing anything
magical, not doing anything mystical.
Everyone in the room received the Holy Spirit.
Why? Because they were in the right
place at the right time, faithfully obedient.
And you go, OK, good point. OK, point.
Be in the room. I'm in the room tonight.
Have you ever been in a church service?
And I've. I've done that.
Been in a church service, read your Bible, prayed, done
everything faithful. I'm in the room, Nat.
I'm always in the room. I'm here Wednesdays.
I'm here Sunday morning. I'm here Sunday night.
I'm reading my Bible faithfully. But no wind, no fire, so God's
not moving, right? Wrong.
No goosebumps, no Holy Ghost goosebumps, no shaking of the
building. I have been in a building though
on a Sunday service where earthquake happened.
It was pretty amazing. It's not good, I wouldn't
recommend it. We may even move to Christian
circles where they're able to manufacture, wind and fire
through their elaborate budgets, Polish production programmes.
And I'd say again, as I said, unfortunately this is not the
spirit. I would say it's not the Spirit
I know I'm able to manufacture with through music.
I would call that production clever production.
In contrast, in our passage today, this particular method of
the arrival of the Holy Spirit was unique.
And you know, it's not ever repeated in Scripture again.
This never happens again. No wind, no fire in this
particular manner. Why?
As I stated at the start, this event is a foundation and not a
formula. A foundation, not a formula.
Do you remember when the Holy Spirit descended upon Jesus when
he was being baptised by John the Baptist?
What form did he take? A dove.
No doves. In this place, it's different
again, and you find throughout the New Testament, whenever
Jesus or God doesn't work in the Gospels, it's different every
time. And I'll explain that.
It's because God chooses when he wants to move.
God chooses how he wants to move, and God chooses who he
wants to move through. Why?
It's enough, he's gone, why not? But I also think it's because we
have a tendency as believers, as the church, as leaders sometimes
is to worship at the altar of Polish process.
We're enamoured with it. And more recently, just look at
YouTube for a bit, popular preachers as well.
I found this little quote from one of my favourite writers you.
If you ever pick up a book by AW Tozer, please do.
They're plentiful. But he wrote this back in 1950.
He said how shamefully do we exploit the converted celebrity.
Anyone will do. We honour them in our public
meetings and the religious press.
Thus we glorify men to enhance the standing of the Church of
God. And the glory of the Prince of
Life is made to hang upon the fame of a man who shall die.
That's 75 years ago that he wrote this and it's still
happening today. I'll talk about a more recent
one. The modern church did this with
a Kanye West or a Yee. Now I'm not going to judge his
character, character, character Yee.
That's that's Yee. Anybody know Kanye?
Not personally, right? But unfortunately in 2019 or
fortunately depends, I'll let again God can judge his
character. But he was paraded as soon as he
made a professional faith. All the largest churches in
America that could afford him paraded him in front of their
church. 1 even had him lead their church service.
It was called Sunday service. And I imagine now knowing what
they know, they're probably frantically scrubbing their live
streams to eradicate any reference of Kanye West.
And I think honestly, they'd be embarrassed with him actually
being in there. I imagine.
I can't imagine having him lead our Sunday service.
We should be. That would be.
But as soon as he became. Because if, if Kanye got to the
Lord, then surely everybody else would come to the Lord.
If Kanye can get saved, then my friend will get saved because
now God is cool, right? As if God ever needed our help.
It doesn't need our help to do anything.
There was nothing that these people did in order to bring
down the Holy Spirit. It came exactly when God wanted
the Holy Spirit to descend. And I'd say the glory belongs
only to God. Now I want to look at the
different responses to the falling of the Holy Spirit
first. It's really simple because it's
actually broken down. I don't know if your Bible does
it, but my Bible does it quite simply.
It says the crowd's response. So we're going to do the crowd's
response because everybody today is enamoured with a crowd.
This read Acts 2/5 to 13 and they were dwelling in Jerusalem,
Jews, devout men from every nation under heaven.
And when this sound occurred, the multitude came together and
were confused because everyone heard them speak in his own
language, verse 7. Then they were all amazed and
marvelled, saying to one another, Look, are not all these
who speak Galileans? And how is it that we hear each
in our own language in which we were born?
9 Parthians, Medes, Elamites, those dwelling in Mesopotamia,
Judea and Cappadocia, Pontius and Asia, Phrygia and Pamphylia,
Egypt and the parts of Libya adjoining Cyrene, visitors from
Rome, both Jews and proselytes. So those who can had converted
Gentiles who had converted to Judaism, Cretans and Arabs, we
hear them speaking in their own tongues the wonderful works of
God. So they were all amazed and
perplexed saying to one another whatever could this mean?
Others mocking said they are full of new wine.
Verse 5 devout men. Now, the during this festival
period, estimates put the crowd that were gathered there
between, I know it's huge because they weren't really
taking records back then. 150,000 to 300,000 people there.
That's a huge crowd. That's a good crusade crowd,
right? That's a lot of people.
If we had a gathering of 300,000 people, you'd be like, OK, we're
in business here, all right, The Flyers worked, promos worked,
we're good to go. Verse 6 says the multitude heard
in their own language. What did they hear is critical.
What did they hear? Our answer is in verse 11 we
hear them speaking verse 11 in our own tongues.
What the wonderful works of God. This was touched on last week by
Pastor Keith and it's critical for us to be reminded of it
again. Is a true work of God.
Always glorifies and points to God, especially when a crowd is
gathered. 2nd A true work of the Spirit will move people to
consider the next question that we read in verse 12.
Have a look at verse 12. The next question.
So they were all amazed and perplexed, saying to one
another, whatever could this mean?
See the sport Spirit always draws out a response.
All are drawn. Some are amazed she read in
verse 12, while others mock verse 13.
If we were somehow able to pipe our services and give them
permission to pipe our services into the shopping centre across
the way or even the little pub that's there and they were able
to get a live stream and they let us put our services on their
jumbo screen or their big screen in there.
Their response, It's a good idea.
I know it's a great idea, but and you were filming them and
their responses were you had some people there recording what
their responses were. I imagine you would see some
people who are intrigued. Some people would be drawn by
the Spirit and go, there's something to this, this is
different, there's something that's going on.
And others would just walk past and they would laugh, they would
scoff and they'll go, these guys are idiots.
These guys look crazy. There they are standing with
their hands up. What kind of mental stuff is
this? They must be drunk to be doing
this. That is the response that we get
when the work of the Holy Spirit is done.
Sometimes you get people who are intrigued and will cause them to
ask another question. Others will laugh, others will
mock, others will scoff. It's in the personal response of
Peter that I think we can learn most.
So jump down to verse 14 for me, just verse 14.
But Peter, standing up with the 11, raised his voice and said to
them, Men of Judea and all who dwell in Jerusalem, let this be
known to you and heed my words. This is Peter, Peter the apostle
who once boasted in Matthew 2633.
They all will leave you, I never will.
The same Peter who in the face of opposition only seven weeks
ago. This is 7 weeks from when the
crucifixion of Jesus Christ took place, where he stood warming
his hands by another fire and he used his voice to deny Jesus
loudly 3 times, even to the point of cursing.
This is the same Peter who fled, but now empowered by the Spirit,
he is standing, takes the lead and is about to open his mouth
to speak boldly. What changed?
Seven weeks is not enough time for seminary.
Seven weeks is not enough time to get a PhD in theology.
No attendance in a College of Courage seminar.
Peter who is lacking courage because he fled.
So let's go and take a course, get a cert three, cert 4IN
courage. No time for that.
All that was happening in Peter's life was he was
obediently found in the place that God told him to wait.
Now as a result of the indwelling of the Holy Spirit,
Peter is a new creation and in Peter's response I learn that
the Spirit is not interested in renovating the flesh.
He comes to wither it. A lot has spoken of the power of
the Holy Spirit and the boldness of the Holy Spirit and the works
of the Holy Spirit that are all positive, but there is not a lot
that is preached about the withering ministry of the Holy
Spirit. By that I want to read Isaiah 40
verse 6 to 8. If you want to flick to it,
you're welcome to. I'll give you some time.
Isaiah 46 to 8. And this is something that
really struck me because it's powerful, the work, the
withering work of the Holy Spirit.
Verse 6 of Isaiah 40, the voice said cry out and he said, what
shall I cry? All flesh is grass, and all it's
loveliness is like the flower of the field.
The grass Withers, the flower fades because the breath.
Some of your Bibles would say the Spirit because the breath of
the Lord blows upon it. Surely the people are grass.
The grass Withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God
stands forever. When I read that, it struck me
that I need to allow the Holy Spirit to continue its work of
withering in my life. Let me explain a little bit
here. I read a quote by Spurgeon.
It's a great little book. It's not that expensive.
It's $10 at Kurong. It's called Holy Spirit Power by
Spurgeon. If you haven't read it, I
recommend it, especially after we've done this series.
It'll help fill in some gaps. We're only able to do 6 sermons,
but it's $10 from Kurong. It's a tiny little book, but
it's the word just, and I've never heard anybody put so
eloquently the work of the Holy Spirit.
But he says it this way. He says the Holy Spirit's power
or the work or the ministry of withering is painful and
mournful work, but it must be done.
He goes on to say, I've noticed that persons who are converted
very easily and who come to Christ with relatively little
knowledge of their own depravity have to learn it afterwards.
Know if grace has begun to build in your soul and any of the old
walls of self trust have been left standing, they will come
down sooner or later. The natural building must come
down, planks and plaster, roof and foundation, and we must have
a house that is not made with the hands.
Isn't that beautiful? Peter and his self confidence
had to wither and die, and I believe the Lord demolished that
in the night that Peter denied him three times.
And now we look in our passage here, we see Peter indwelled by
the Holy Spirit. He's not preaching in his own
authority anymore. He's not doing anything in his
own selfish pride. He is bringing the authority of
the Holy Spirit and he is preaching with the authority of
Scripture. Let's look at part of what Peter
preaches on. Let's have a look at his sermon.
I'm going to look at 15 to 21, verse 15 to 21.
Only tonight you can read the rest of it, but I want to focus
in on verse 15 to 21. Peter stands up verse 14 and he
says these verse 15. These are not drunk as you
suppose, since it is only the third hour of the day, basically
9:00 but this is what was spoken by the prophet Joel and it shall
come to pass straight Scripture. He gives now verse 17 to 21 in
the last days says God, that I will pour out my spirit upon all
flesh. Your sons and your daughters
shall prophecy, Your young men shall see visions, your old men
shall dream dreams. And on my manservants and on my
maidservants, I will pour out my spirit in those days, and they
shall prophecy. Verse 19.
I will show wonders in heaven above, and signs in the earth
beneath, blood and fire and vapour of smoke.
Verse 20. The sun shall be turned Into
Darkness now, 7 weeks ago, what happened to the sun when dark,
right? Seven weeks ago, when Jesus was
crucified and he died, it went dark.
So this is familiar for them. I mean, if we saw that the sun
go dark at a time it's not supposed to go only seven weeks
ago, that'd be very fresh in your memory.
It'd be like, what? This guy is nuts.
And the moon into blood before the coming of the great and
awesome day of the Lord. And it shall come to pass that
whoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.
Now I like the King James version.
I was chatting to Pastor Keith a couple weeks ago about this when
I talked about this passage and he highlighted it for me.
So I'll give him credit for that.
But in the King James, the starting of what Peter says in
verse 16, when it says in new King James, it says, but this is
what was spoken by the prophet Joel in the old King James it
says, but this is that. And I think that's critical.
And I've written down that down in my Bible.
This is that because what Peter basically does is something that
we should be able to do with every time that the Holy Spirit
is doing a work in our lives and every time we explaining to I've
got 4 kids. Every time we explain something
that happens in our church service or why we do something
or why we pray a certain way, certain way is we should be able
to grab our Bible, open up to the part and point to it and go
this what you saw what we were doing in church this well, this
is that. If we can't do that, then it
probably shouldn't be going on. And Peter takes that and he's
he, he brings it up. And as I started looking at this
is that there are more this is that's in the Bible.
There are tonnes of them where Moses says to Aaron when his two
sons are destroyed by the fire of God in Leviticus, it's he
goes Aaron. This is that that was written
about anything that takes place in our gathering should be able
to be this is that Peter gives the gathered crowd Scripture.
He gives them the words of the prophet Joel.
He then gives them the words of the psalmist King David in the
second part that I won't read tonight.
The best thing that we can say to anyone or a crowd or anyone
that the Holy Spirit draws to us is exactly what Peter did Here
you have a look through it. There's not too much eloquent
words. There is pure scripture.
If I did nothing else tonight and I apologise for them doing
more than just reading Scripture, I should should learn
from Peter is what we when somebody brings, when God brings
the Holy Spirit, I'm sorry when the Holy Spirit Spirit brings
somebody to us, best thing we can do is give them pure
scripture every time. Why?
Because the result is always so much better.
Jump down to verse 37 and we'll see the result.
So Peter gives scripture word for word.
Now when they heard this, they were cut to the heart and said
to Peter and the rest of the apostles.
Men and brethren, what shall we do?
The Spirit always brings conviction.
I was watching one of my favourite pastors, Pastor Gary
Hamrick of Cornerstone Chapel. He's a covered Chapel pastor,
massive church. Not that that's anything to be
admired, but he's got a large church and he was doing AQ and A
and one of the questions that came up is was on church
discipline. And it was interesting to hear
his response because he says, actually, even though we've got
a Church of a massive size, a large size, they've got between
20 and 30,000 people. That's a lot of people.
That's 30,000 problems, right? It is.
And he goes, you'll be surprised.
We really in they've been he's been pastor there for 30 plus
years. He said we really had to
actually exercise biblical discipline as in the BAWA.
He says, you want to know why? Because in Calvary chapels and
in this church, like they do at the cornerstone, they preach
verse by verse through the Bible.
And he says, and eventually we get to a part where you'll
either be convicted by the Holy Spirit, you'll be cut to the
heart and repent, or he said, unfortunately, they are
convicted and leave the church. And that's the sad part.
But that's what the Holy Spirit does.
It brings a mirror to our face, like I said, with the withering
ministry of the Holy Spirit is it convicts us and we are forced
to have a response to what the Holy Spirit is putting his
finger on in our lives. And it may be painful.
I've got a pretty sore shoulder. I want to bring that up.
My kids said if you bring up your shoulder, we know you're
manipulating, but I busted my shoulder, so I'm going to bring
it up. You're welcome. 8 weeks ago.
And it's tender. And that's how I picture the
work of the Holy Spirit is in my life.
There's things as I sit under the word or as I read that the
Holy Spirit is like poking not on my shoulder, but on that
little bit of area in my life that I need the work of the Holy
Spirit. It's a little tender and it's
convicting. It's not always you go, oh, wow,
that was good. That felt really good today.
A true work of the Holy Spirit always convicts.
And as I said, there's only two responses to that conviction.
The person is cut to the heart, they repent, or they are
convert, convicted and unfortunately leave the church.
Let's look at verse 38 because I want to look at the message that
Peter gives to this crowd who says what shall we do?
And Peter's response is repent and let everyone of you be
baptised and in in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission
of sins and you shall receive the gift.
I've circled that, the gift of the Holy Spirit.
Peter doesn't say. Come on back next week and we'll
work up some more wind, some more fire.
It's cool that you're interested.
Love that. That's good for you.
I'm glad that the Holy Spirit's convicted you.
He gives him a straight up gospel message.
Pretty simple. And I've noticed this for me is
it's 33 points. Repent, be baptised, receive the
Spirit. Imagine if that was our response
when people ask, oh, there's carriage apple, what do you guys
do? Oh, you know, we kind of sing
songs all sorts, you know, a bit long sometimes, old mate.
Here goes another verse. You know what if we said, what
must you do? Repent, be baptised, receive the
Spirit Whenever I flick on, sometimes on again.
I mentioned YouTube a few too many times tonight.
I apologise. But you listen to a Billy Graham
sermon and it hits differently. Not because he's Billy Graham
and he has a deep voice. It hits because in every one of
his sermons he always says repent, be baptised, receive the
Spirit. It's pretty powerful, those
words. Again, you've got to do
something with that. So when you say that to
somebody, they've got to go repent for what, be baptised for
what, receive the Spirit. It elicits a response.
Little bit of a joke. I think I've got time for it,
but I find a bit of humour in verse 3040.
Have a look, have a look at verse 40 and maybe some of you
are thinking this now. It's right at the top.
And with many other words, he testified and exhorted them
saying be safe from this perverse generation.
Now, I imagine that Luke dozed off during the sermon or he's
giving some critical sermon feedback.
No, anybody get that sense of humour?
I'm like, I just imagine Luke's going, I don't know.
And with many other words at this point, I dozed off.
So maybe it gives me it gives me some comfort because that's what
happened some Sundays, I'll be honest is I'm there.
And what did the pastor say? He said something about the Holy
Spirit and with many other words.
So you're welcome to use that one tonight.
What did Nat say? Something about the Holy Spirit
and many other words I don't know.
Anyways, all right, I found that funny.
Verse 41 back to serious part is then those who gladly received
his word were baptised and that day about 3000 souls were added
to them. Again 3000 is a huge number.
That's ridiculous. 3000 people baptised and it's never the
number we should be impressed by.
For me, I've learnt again, I've been in ministry since age of 17
and I'm old now, about to be 45. But I've learnt because I used
to be enamoured with numbers. I used to watch those churches
that had massive stadium type structures and I'd see their
hands raised and I'd see those things.
Oh man, that would be awesome to have that happen.
And it would be, it would be. But I would say a lot of those
churches that I used to worship, which is a bad word to use, but
I would be enamoured with, unfortunately disappear Now
they're gone. That's how old I am, is they
have come to nothing because why?
It was a work of men, unfortunately, which is really
sad. And I if I read about another
preacher that I once admired, I've got, I keep throwing away
books because there's some preachers books that I had when
I go, he's gone too. What the heck?
Unfortunately, a lot of these works that are happening where
it appears by all appearances that it is a great work of God.
Unfortunately, they're dissolved into nothing, and that's really
sad. What we should be looking for,
what I now look for is the fruit that follows a work of the Holy
Spirit. And I want us to always evaluate
the work of the Holy Spirit by the fruit that it produces.
And I would ask the question when somebody is saved or
professors to be saved, as I did with Kanye or any of these
others, There's a couple others, I won't mention their name.
I would say what are they saved to, what are they saved to do or
what are they saved to is really simple.
Save to attend church, save to get a baptism insurance policy,
save to feel better about themselves, to get Holy Spirit
vibes. No, a genuine work of the Holy
Spirit is what we see in verse 42.
And they continued steadfastly in the apostles doctrine and
fellowship, in the breaking of bread and in prayers.
Pretty simple. So you want to know how to judge
work of Holy Spirit? Are they devoted to the word of
God? Are they devoted to fellowship?
Are they devoted to the breaking of bread, communion, and the
other commands that were instructed through the Bible?
Are they devoted to prayer? Because anyone can raise their
hands, anyone can come forward. How do you know the Spirit has a
hold of someone's life? Pretty simple.
Not hype, but another H word habit.
Not emotion but obedience. Another commentator I like,
Matthew Henry, says you should always ask after you read a
passage in the Bible, this question.
So what? So what?
Because So what takes, which again, I'll talk about myself
because I can't speak for you, is there's often a tendency in
when we're under a teaching to go.
I'm glad so and so's here because they needed to hear
that. I'm glad Bill's here.
You know who needs to hear this? Your sister in law.
You're so and so I'm elbowing my wife while we're talking about
it. You know who this be good for?
Reg Reg needs to hear this. But when you ask the question,
So what Matthew Henry says, it takes the pointed finger and
points it directly back at you. And So what is something that I
have written now in my Bible is when I read a passage I go, So
what? OK, so this happened.
This event was great. 3000 people were saved.
Peter was bold. The crowd was amazed and asked
more. Some mocked So what?
What's the point? Pastor Keith preached this last
Sunday and he said that the acts of the Holy Spirit are still
taking place today and only began at Pentecost.
And I agree with that. The Spirit still convicts,
empowers and transforms. Definitely today.
The question isn't when am I going to hear wind from heaven
or see tongues of fire like they did in Acts, which is spa from
what we do. And it was honest.
If I'm being honest, it was something that I was excited
about when we started this. I'm like, I'm going to tap into
that power, right? I'm going to find out as much as
I can know about the Holy Spirit.
I'm going to read all the books I've got.
I'm going to order some more, and I'm going to figure this
thing out so I can have the Holy Spirit work more powerfully in
my life. And that's not bad.
That in itself is a good thing. Who would condemn?
None of us would condemn somebody for doing that.
However, what the error was, and I think this is where we go
astray, is I was looking for the wind.
I was looking for the fire rather than focusing on the one
who creates the wind and the fire.
Jesus said to Nicodemus in John 38, the wind blows where it
wishes and you hear the sound of it but cannot tell where it
comes from and where it goes. So is everyone who is born of
the Spirit. You want to know more of the
work of the Holy Spirit? What I figured out in this in my
own study, the keyword it's one word.
It's obedience. Obedience.
Obedience to hear and trust God's word.
From our passage, the disciples were told they would be baptised
in the Holy Spirit not too many days from now.
Obedience to be where God has asked us to be.
The disciples were told not to leave Jerusalem.
Obedience to wait when God says wait because our disciples, they
were told to wait for the promise from the Father.
And lastly, obedience to do what God has asked us to do.
The disciples were told that they shall be witnesses in
Jerusalem in Judea and Samaria and to the end of the earth.
And I say obedience, though, and immediately some of you may be
triggered, may go off because I think trigger not triggered, but
obedience is a such AI was going to say something that that's
offensive, right? That's the word that the the
kids use and that's how our kids say it today.
And the young kids say that's offensive, that's offensive,
that's offensive, right? It is because you say obedient
and immediately you get that I'm not really down for obedience.
I don't really do that anymore. We don't do obedience too much
anymore, but it's not blind obedience to some cosmic
killjoy, even though God in His power could demand it.
Instead, it's obedience to a loving Father.
And as a dad of four, there are a lot of times I ask my kids to
be obedient. Would you get in the car?
Because I want to take you somewhere that is actually cool.
But if you don't get in the car and follow my instructions,
guess what? You're going to miss out.
Would you do again? I was a teacher.
Would you study? Would you obediently study one
student in the audience here of mine?
Would you study? Because if you are obedient and
would study, then you would actually get results.
As I said, God could demand our obedience, but He doesn't.
It's obedience to a loving Father who said to Adam and Eve
in the garden, All these trees, all of these you are free to eat
from, except this one, because why this one?
The day you eat of it, you will surely die.
This one's dangerous. Please be obedient.
All of this you can eat. There's one here, though, that I
don't want you to get hurt by. Pure obedience.
It's obedience to our heavenly Father who says in Luke 11, if a
son asks for bread from any father among you, will he give
him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will
he give him a serpent instead of a fish?
Or if he asks for an egg, will he offer him a scorpion?
If you then, being evil know how to give good gifts to your
children, how much more will your holy will your heavenly
Father give you? Notice this the Holy Spirit to
those who ask Him.