“In the last days it will be that I will pour out my Spirit upon all humanity declares God" Acts:2
Pentecost which is observed by most Christian bodies,
has been for centuries looked upon as the moment within the stream of human
history that God inaugurated something new, and this new operation of God
within history it is viewed is the emergence of the Church as the visible
evidence of this new operation of God.
Confirmation
of the Resurrection
There is truth to this view, however, what that glorious moment, which see as
Pentecost, is rather , the confirmation
of what we see occurring on that glorious Easter morning fifty days prior ,which
is, that the through the Resurrection of
Jesus the glorious incarnate Lord is
come from the dead. That death could not contain him and that the incarnate
Lord is risen, and St. Paul tells us in his Romans Epistle that the
resurrection proclaims the divine identity of Jesus as God’s holy Son, Rom: 1:4, and what we are able to view
through the Scriptures is the open manifestation of this eternal truth.
What
is new, or experienced in a new way, is our participation with our incarnate risen
Lord. That is Pentecost is about experiencing the incarnation who is now
ascended into the Heavens.
“When the Day of
Pentecost had come, they were all gathered together in one place. Suddenly from
heaven there came a sound like the rush of a mighty wind and it filled the
house where they were gathered. Divided tongues of fire appeared among them and
a tongue rested on each of them. And all of them were filled with the Holy
Spirit and began to speak with other languages as the Spirit gave them the
ability.” Acts: 2:1-4
From the rest of St. Luke’s narrative tells us that a
great number of devout Jews who had come from around the Roman world , were
witness to this amazing manifestation of the Holy Spirit as they each heard the
Apostles proclaiming the saving acts of
God in their own language.
These Jews asked the question “what does this mean?” (12b)
Upon
All Humanity
St.
Peter answers this question through the use of Apocalyptic language found in
the Prophet Joel as an explanation using dramatic imagery to stress the power
of the foreseen as something which cannot and would not be contained.
“In
the last days it will be that I will pour out my Spirit upon all humanity declares
God, and your sons and daughters will prophesy, and your young men will see
visions and your old men will dream dreams. Even upon slaves, both men and
woman. In those days I will pour out my Spirit; and they will prophecy” (17-18)
St. Peter is explaining that what was happing there in
the Holy city of Jerusalem is the pouring out of the Holy Spirit upon all
humanity, so that they might experience the incarnation of the Lord Jesus.
This
word proclaimed by St. Peter not only tells us what God has done, but all the
more it reveals God’s the sweeping scope of his divine intent toward and for “all
humanity”.
It is God, the Holy Trinity’s intent that “all humanity” experience the incarnation
of Jesus, and what we are witness to, in St. Luke’s account in Acts on the Day
of Pentecost is the manifestation of the risen incarnate Lord in the lives of
his Disciples for and toward “all
humanity” as represented by the Jews “from
every nation under Heaven” at Jerusalem.
Jesus
Not Found in the Temple
These “devout
Jews” had come to worship God in the Temple, but found him in the streets
in the lives of the Disciples of Jesus, not in religion, but in the lives of
those who have come to believe in Jesus, who see the truth that he is the
incarnate Son of God.
It is God’s intent that “all humanity”, “all flesh”,
experience the incarnation of Jesus. The whole Christian life is about coming
to experience the incarnation deeper and deeper in a personal relationship.
The people around us
see the manifestation in our lives so that they can as the Jews did “what does
this mean?” which provides us the Pentecostal moment of sharing the Gospel
about what our God has done for “all
humanity” and they too can experience the risen incarnate Jesus which is
what our God has provide for “all
humanity” .
We
Proclaim
St. John wrote of his and the others Disciples
experience with the incarnate Jesus as being the motivation for the Gospel’s
proclamation down through the ages even from the very onset of God’s divine
purpose.
“That
which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen and
touched with our hands-this is what we have proclaimed to you concerning the
Word of life. The life appeared; we have seen it and testified to it, and
proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and has appeared to
us. We proclaim to you what we have seen and heard, so that you might have
fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the father and with his Son,
Jesus Christ.” 1Jhn:1:1-3
This fellowship is what God has always intended for “all humanity”, “all flesh”. That we all come to fellowship with him. This is the
Gospel which is message, of the collective voice of the Church. The Apocalyptic
nature of that message is powerful and dramatic and should be obvious to the
world around us.
Through this relationship, the incarnate risen Jesus is
manifested to “all humanity" in a
most profound Apocalyptic way in the lives of believers, which is the Church,
in a powerful meaning, meaningful way. This tells us, that it is vital that all
believers in Jesus need to gather together; for through one another we experience
and manifest the incarnation in and through each other and to “all humanity”, “all flesh”.
Through
the Holy Spirit
The Holy Spirit,
the Third person of the Holy Trinity, is the means by which Jesus himself comes
to us as the risen incarnate Word of life, the eternal Son of God, the Second
Person of the Holy Trinity. Jesus speaks to this truth of the manifestation of
his risen life through the Holy Spirit in the lives of his Disciples.
“I
will ask the Father, and he will give you another comforter to help you and be
with you forever the Spirit of Truth” Jhn: 14:16-17
This comforter, the Holy Spirit, is the means by which
Jesus is come to us that is, poured out on “all
humanity”. The comforter’s, the Holy Spirit’s coming is Jesus himself
manifesting in the lives of his Disciples throughout the ages.
“I
will not leave you orphans, I will come to you” (18)
The Holy Spirit brings the risen incarnate Jesus into
our lives, and produce the evidence of a living Savior to “all humanity”. Through God the
Holy Spirit, Jesus pours himself, his very self upon the flesh of all, and
flows out of the live of his Disciples to the “all humanity” so that they too come to believe and experience the
risen incarnation, the purpose of all human life is to experience the
incarnation.
We each live, “all humanity” so that we might experience
the incarnation of Jesus. This why Jesus has come in the flesh so that as St.
John wrote “what we have seen and heard”
,that is , we have encountered in the flesh Jesus’ own flesh , and in our own flesh, the incarnation.
Pentecost demonstrates the purpose of the operation of
God in the lives of those who have come to believe in Jesus. That we might, each and all, experience Jesus’
incarnation in our lives in a powerful unmistakable Apocalyptic way, so that “all humanity” will come to believe in, and
receive Jesus, and come to know the great God, the Father, the Son and the Holy
Spirit, as it was there in the Holy city a little over two thousand years ago
and through the ages.
Benediction:
May we each and all come to experience the incarnation of our risen Lord Jesus
through the Holy Spirit being poured out upon “all humanity” today,
tomorrow and forevermore. Amen.
Rev. Todd Crouch, Pastor
The Fountain of life Church a Congregation of Grace Communion 2101 Old National Pike. Washington, Pennsylvania, 15301
The Fountain of Life is heard on the RKP Radio Network 1710 and 1670 AM in Washington and North Franklin ,and 1790 AM in the Arden Fair Grounds area of Washington Pennsylvania, and on 1710 AM in Bentleyville and Monongahela, Pennsylvania. And online around the world at www.rkpradio.com
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