Today we are observing Pentecost Sunday, the day the Holy Spirit was poured out on those who were in the Upper Room in Jerusalem who had been waiting as Jesus had instructed, for the promised Holy Spirit. Let’s dive into the Pentecost account. Acts 1:4-8 4 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; 5 for John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now.” 6 So when they had come together, they asked him, “Lord, will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?” 7 He said to them, “It is not for you to know times or seasons that the Father has fixed by his own authority. 8 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.”
Acts 2:1-12 1When the day of Pentecost arrived, they were all together in one place. 2 And suddenly there came from heaven a sound like a mighty rushing wind, and it filled the entire house where they were sitting. 3 And divided tongues as of fire appeared to them and rested[a] on each one of them. 4 And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance.
5 Now there were dwelling in Jerusalem Jews, devout men from every nation under heaven. 6 And at this sound the multitude came together, and they were bewildered, because each one was hearing them speak in his own language. 7 And they were amazed and astonished, saying, “Are not all these who are speaking Galileans? 8 And how is it that we hear, each of us in his own native language? 9 Parthians and Medes and Elamites and residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, 10 Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya belonging to Cyrene, and visitors from Rome, 11 both Jews and proselytes, Cretans and Arabians—we hear them telling in our own tongues the mighty works of God.” 12 And all were amazed and perplexed, saying to one another, “What does this mean?”
Have you seen the TV show, “Hoarders?” It is a show where a team of therapists and organization specialists go into a home to help someone who has collected and filled their home with stuff, whether valuable stuff or trash. They help people get rid of all of the stuff that has stifled their life. In each case, their relationships are stifled because no one wants to go into the environment they have created. I’m not a hoarder, but I wish someone would come up with a TV show called “Dust Bunnies” or “Closet Cleaners,” because I’d sign up for that one. But I digress!
Spiritually speaking, I think perhaps we are sometimes in danger of becoming hoarders of spiritual experiences, and in particular, we are in danger of becoming hoarders of the Holy Spirit. Instead of allowing the Holy Spirit to flow through us to reach others, we collect spiritual experiences through Christian TV, Christian music, church services, Christian books, Christian concerts, and Christian conferences and we sort of stuff ourselves full of the Spirit of God without realizing that the reason we are supposed to get full is in order that we might get emptied. We are supposed to get full and then empty all of that fullness into the lives of others. However, it’s often like we’re at this spiritual buffet, sampling this aspect and that aspect of the Spirit. We get full of good stuff for sure, but if we never empty it out into the world, we become full and sleepy rather than full and energized to allow God’s Spirit to flow through us into the world around us.
In my opinion, we don’t have a filling problem. We have an emptying issue. Have you ever considered that it is possible to become spiritually selfish? Let me challenge you with what I have come to know is true. Experiencing the presence of God in the worship event or through some exciting presentation of a sermon or conference or through intercessory prayer as someone lays their hands on us-that’s all wonderful.
It is wonderful to receive the comfort and healing and enabling the Spirit brings to our lives. I wouldn’t want to live without it. However, it pales in comparison to the experience you can have with the Spirit as you allow the Spirit to flow through you, emptying you out as God’s love and mercy and healing and grace are spilled out through your life to the people around you. It is a different level of ministry in the Holy Spirit when you become a channel through which He flows than it is to be a reservoir which He fills.
Obviously, you have to be filled before He can flow through you, but the process of engaging with the Spirit where you allow the Holy Spirit to flow through you as the Spirit of Christ in order to transform lives around you is the purpose for which the Holy Spirit will fill you. He doesn’t fill you in order to make you spiritually full and fat. He fills you in order to flow through you so that the ministry of Christ continues to change lives. In other words, God doesn’t want you to sit and soak it all in but to soak it in, in order that He might flow through you to saturate the rest of the world with the same kind of joy, healing, power, and comfort that you have received.
What did Acts 1:8 say? “You will receive power to be my witnesses.” When the tongues of fire rested on those who were there, an enabling came to them that had nothing to do with what they had studied in school or learned at home or through any life experience. An enabling came to them by the Holy Spirit so that the Word of God would flow through them to saturate the ears of the crowd that had gathered from various parts of the world at that time. The empowering was so that God’s Spirit would flow through them to accomplish His work. We are to partner with the Holy Spirit so that we can do the ministry of Christ. Jesus came to make God known. He came to seek and save the lost. God’s will is that we would do the same.
We see this demonstrated in the life of Jesus. The Bible tells us that Jesus was full of the Holy Spirit, Luke 4:14. In Isaiah 61 and in Luke 4:18-19 we are told why Jesus was full of the Holy Spirit.
He said, “The Spirit of the LORD is upon Me, because He has anointed Me to
Proclaim (the Gospel) the good news to the poor
To bind up the brokenhearted
Proclaim liberty to the captives
And recovery of sight to the blind
To set at liberty those who are oppressed
To proclaim the acceptable year of the LORD.
Jesus was filled or anointed in order to do something. The power of God flowed through Him to bring the Good News of the Gospel to people, to heal them in the deepest places of their brokenness, to set people free from the condemnation that comes with our inability to keep the Law, from self-imposed and satanic bondages, to bring freedom to those who need to know they can succeed and don’t have to live as victims of their life’s circumstances and to let them know that God’s timing is perfect and that in time God does bring blessing and victory to those who trust in Him.
Jesus showed us what it was like to lead a Spirit-filled life and to allow the power of God to flow through a person to bring change to those He encountered. Jesus was in the power of the Spirit while in the flesh, but He was confined to one place and one time. Though it was a miraculous and prolific ministry, it was a limited ministry. However, after demonstrating what the Spirit-filled life was like where ultimate victory, even victory of death, was on display, He ascended in power to the Father and sent the Holy Spirit to all who would receive it. That way, God’s power, in multiplied ways could be at work in multiplied places in and through all who would believe and receive the Spirit.
What Jesus accomplished was amazing and He said in John 14:12 that we would do greater works than He did. The verses that follow in John 14 talk about how those greater works will be accomplished. The Holy Spirit would live in us-John 14:17. It would no longer be One person, filled with the Holy Spirit, doing God’s work on earth, but millions of people who would receive the Spirit of God who would spread across the globe to accomplish the work of Christ! Wow! We aren’t filled to sit and soak, but we’re soaked by the Spirit to saturate the world with the transforming power of Jesus.
Jesus came to preach the Gospel to the poor with the poor being those who realized they needed help, those who realized they couldn’t save themselves, those who were seeking salvation.
Matthew 5:3 says, “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” The term, “poor” here is the Greek word, “ptochos” which carries the implication of being a beggar. We are to be conduits for the Spirit of God to those who are seeking salvation, to those who recognize they are poor in spirit and need God’s help.
When the Word of God was preached in multiple languages on the day of Pentecost, the Gospel was received with power by over 3000 people that day. There were more than 3000 present, but 3000 got saved. Not everyone will be saved. Not everyone is willing to admit they need to be. Not everyone who heard on the day of Pentecost was saved. Some mocked the disciples saying, “They must be drunk.” It was obviously weird, and they couldn’t wrap their minds around the multiple languages being spoken at once. But for those who are open to the Spirit of God, when that Spirit is flowing through our lives as we share the Gospel, it will become irresistible and life changing like it was for 3000 on that day!
In the power of the Spirit, let’s saturate the world with healing and restoration. Acts 10:38 says, “God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power. He went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with him.”
Jesus didn’t act on His own authority or in His own power, though He had every right to because even though He was fully human, He was also fully Divine. However, Philippians tells us that He emptied Himself of the power and authority He could have relied on and instead was filled with the Holy Spirit’s power and was obedient to the Father’s work. And God’s work and will is that people are healed and restored.
The world is broken. Part of our opportunity as the Spirit-filled people of God is to allow words and acts of healing and restoration to flow through us to people who are healed when they find out God cares. They are healed when they understand there is a remedy for sin. They are healed when someone takes time to disciple them and show them the way. They are healed in their minds when we teach them the Truth of God’s Word. They are healed in their bodies when we pray for them and they get well. It’s nothing we do or could do, but it is what the Spirit of God does through us when we allow Him to flow through our lives.
Peter and John were walking in the temple courts one day after being filled with the Holy Spirit. There was a beggar sitting there who asked them for money. Peter and John didn’t have money to give him, and it’s a good thing for him that they didn’t. Money would have gotten the man through another day, but a healing enabled by the Holy Spirit would transform His entire future. Listen, when we operate in the power of the Spirit, we are able to bring newness to people’s lives that enables them long-term stability and growth. In the power of the Spirit let’s saturate the world with freedom!
People are in bondage to all kinds of things whether physical and sexual addictions, hang-ups, in bondage to other people, to money, to negative thinking, to people’s expectations or whatever. The Holy Spirit wants to soak us in Christ’s freedom so we can saturate the world with it.
The world is tired of relationships with strings attached. The world is tired of hidden agendas. The beauty of a freeing relationship with Jesus is that He hides nothing, has no hidden agenda and is as up front as you can get. He doesn’t want you to be a slave to anything or anyone. He wants to set you free so that you can love and serve Him in the kind of relationship that will empower and bless you not squelch and squash you.
Let’s show the world that John 8:36 is absolutely true, “ So, if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.”
In the power of the Spirit, let’s open some blind eyes. Let’s demonstrate that a holy life is possible, that God is real and that there is peace you can really experience! Let’s show people that it’s possible to keep the faith in hard times, to live in harmony with one another and to do good works rather than be selfish. Let’s demonstrate that we can bless instead of curse and that we can seek to give rather than gain.
In the power of the Spirit, let’s show the world that the time to accept all God offers is now. The “acceptable year of the Lord” that Jesus proclaimed was tied to the concept of the Year of Jubilee. In this Old Testament practice, during the year of Jubilee all debts were canceled. Slaves were set free. Jesus came to cancel all the debts that sin had racked up against us and to proclaim our forever freedom from sin and its penalty!
We receive this healing and good news and freedom into our lives so that in the power of the Spirit we can saturate the world with the same. That’s why I love the symbolism of the Holy Spirit as tongues of fire. A fire spreads. It doesn’t stay contained unless you do something to contain it. We’re told not to quench the Holy Spirit. I Thess. 5:19 tells us not to put out the Spirit’s fire. We’re not told to create wildfire or to try to start a fire, but we are told not to put out the Spirit’s fire.
One thing I absolutely cherish is the presence of God. I don’t want to be here if God isn’t here. We dare not take for granted the special way the Holy Spirit is present each week in this place. We also need to stay open to the Spirit and seek the Spirit in order to ensure that we don’t assume what the Spirit will do or ever try to box the Spirit in. Like a fire spreads where it will, the Spirit will lead us where we need to be. We just need to follow.
Paul was referring to the Holy Spirit when he told his protégé Timothy in II Timothy 1:6 to “Fan into flame the gift of God that was in him.” What he was saying was, “Live in the power of the Spirit. Serve in the power of the Spirit. Pay attention to the Holy Spirit that is in you and allow the Spirit to flow through you.”
It is the Holy Spirit who gives gifts to Christians not just for the benefit of the Christians. The Holy Spirit gives gifts to Christians so that as the Spirit flows through the person in the expression of that gift, other people get the benefit of being touched by the Spirit of God. See I Cor. 12:4-7. The Spirit empowers us for the common good so that the Body of Christ can be built up.
God fills us to flow through us to benefit others. Everyone gets blessed through the life of a Spirit-filled Christian who allows the Spirit to flow through them. We’re told in I Peter 4:10 to use the gifts we have been given to serve others and that as we do, we administer God’s grace. As we exercise the gifts God has given us, the Spirit flows through us and God’s grace is channeled to the world around us.
What could happen if everyone in this room would make a commitment to daily acknowledge the Holy Spirit and seek to submit to the Holy Spirit and be used by the Holy Spirit? In Acts 2, the Spirit flowed through those who had been together in unity, seeking to receive the Spirit, and 3000 people were saved that day. All kinds of miracles were taking place.
Why did such dramatic miracles take place back then? I believe it was because those who were being used were focused on life in the Spirit. They waited for the Spirit. They wanted the Spirit. They submitted to the Spirit. When the Spirit was poured out on them, they didn’t say, “Well, thanks but no thanks. We’d rather not speak in the language of the Medes.” They didn’t say, “We’d rather have power to heal than preach.” They didn’t say, “We’d rather not be used in such a public way.” They simply yielded.
People without the Spirit of God have nothing to offer the world. People who are filled with the Spirit of God have everything to offer the world. We need to start fanning into flame the gift of the Holy Spirit that is in each one of us because what the world needs is the transforming power of God. We have what the world needs if we will allow God to use us.
Jesus told the woman at the well she could receive living water in John 4. Brothers and sisters, living water flows. It isn’t stagnated. We aren’t to be a repository or a receptacle for the Holy Spirit, but a channel a conduit through which the Spirit can flow.
Yes, you need the Spirit of God in order to be transformed into the image of Christ. Yes, you need the Spirit of God to know the will of God. Yes, you need the Spirit of God to understand the Bible. Yes, you need the Spirit of God to have victory over temptation. Just as badly as you need the Spirit of God for all of those reasons, so does the world, and unless God’s Spirit is flowing through you to reach them, they may never experience it.
God never intended to gift us in order for us to serve ourselves. No Sir. No ma’am. You need to learn to go with the flow of the Spirit so that others get help. Ephesians 5:18 says “Be filled with the Holy Spirit.” Yes, soak it all in. Be filled, and then be emptied into the lives of the people around you.
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