WE’VE WANDERED too long in this desert. The old generation has gone. It’s time to enter the land. But can we cross Jordan? Can we come to the land of milk and honey? Ask God now!

The first Christians had to enter their land of blessing. You never just wake up one morning and find the wind has blown you over the border during the night. The Red Sea must part for us; Jordan must be breached.

“Wait here,” said Jesus. It wasn’t that waiting is special. It was all about God’s time to do a new thing.
“Wait here,” said Jesus. He wants us to be in place when the Spirit comes in power.
And that’s what Acts 2 is about. Acts 1 told us the day of blessing was on its way; Acts 2 tells us what happened on that day.

Did you hear? The Spirit came in power. Did you hear? The world paid attention. Did you hear? The Christians found boldness. Did you hear? The gospel went out to all nations. Did you hear? The Church began to grow.

Five things that God wants us to hear today:

• Spirit power,
• attentive unbelievers,
• bold Christians,
• declared gospel,
• growing Church.
  

In our age, we have a form of godliness, but we deny its power; the world sees us, but it doesn’t pay attention; we have lost our bold witness, so the gospel doesn’t reach beyond our four walls, and the consequence is that the church doesn’t grow.

Before I was married, my father organised some work on the house. He got my cousin, Michael, to come. Michael was a carpenter.
Every lunchtime, Michael went out on his little motor scooter. He preached at Fairfield Station, then he came back to go on with the work. God had touched his life, and he just wanted to share it with everyone who might want to listen.
God had touched his life by the Holy Spirit’s power, and he couldn’t keep it to himself.

THE SPIRIT COMES IN POWER
I believe that the Christian Church has made a vast mistake. We have taken all the goodness out of our faith, and then we wonder why the crumbs don’t sustain life.

The early Church baptised by full immersion in the rivers and lakes. But the time came when they didn’t use any more water than you could wring out of a towel after your bath. A few drops on a baby’s forehead was enough.

The early Church had a feast with bread and wine to celebrate the presence of Jesus as the Risen Lord in the midst of his people. But the time came when it was refined down to a speck of bread and a thimbleful of red drink.

The early Church had the full. powerful presence of the Holy Spirit. But the time came when they had a half-remembered doctrine of the Holy Spirit instead.

Did you pick up the truths in our passage?

The Spirit came: they felt him.

The Spirit came and they heard him.

The Spirit came: they saw his fire among them.

Yes, the Spirit came, and they manifested him in their lives.

He came like a mighty, rushing wind. He came in tongues of fire, separated and resting on each of them. He came and shook the place where they were. That day, the Spirit came. He came and they declared God’s wonders in other languages as the Spirit gave them ability. Every believer in that place manifested a response to the Spirit’s presence. God never intended us merely to know about the Spirit. He intended us to experience him and respond to him.

There is no mere doctrine of the Spirit here. This was an experience of the Spirit, and that made all the difference.

At Fairfield Council we all knew about John D’s wedding. I never met John. I had seen some of his work. He was a good draftsman whose spelling left a bit to be desired. But his wedding was the big event.
He had a big white American V8, and he never washed it. But, for his wedding, he decided to make an exception.
Unfortunately for him, someone got wind of his plans. So they dabbed a few spots of oil on his car, a fingerprint here and there on the roof and bonnet and bootlid. Then they sprinkled fluoricene dye powder on the oil. It’s about the most potent dye available, and it doesn’t stain.When it’s dry, it’s an inoffensive dull orange powder. But wet, it’s a different story. They use it for air-sea rescue, because a pen cap full would dye a square kilometre of ocean bright, fluorescent green. Picture it! The car ran green for hours as John tried to wash it.

Everyone knew that story. It was part of being one of the Council staff. If you hadn’t been there, you still shared in the story.

When the Spirit came in power on the Church, everyone shared the experience. It bound them into a community, based on experiences that no one else had.

The Spirit came to be experienced. He came for a shared experience, a community–forming experience.

And the Spirit came to break traditions. That’s a lot of what Peter says in his sermon. He quotes Joel. He says that the old ways are ending, that old traditions of social order, of in–groups and out–groups, of gender distinctions... all the old traditions are irrelevant. The young men shall see vision and the old men shall dream; the non–professionals shall prophesy; even female slaves, at the bottom of the heap, will receive the Spirit’s power and the gift of prophecy.

But the sermon came later. Before Peter began to preach, the Church began to act. They were all proclaiming God’s glory; they were all speaking aloud, they were all breaking with tradition and letting the Spirit rule. That’s the way God planned it; that’s the way God means it to be

THE WORLD TAKES NOTICE
When the Church follows its regular path, when it substitutes blandness for boldness, the world couldn’t care less. Some years ago, they rewrote Onward, Christian Soldiers.
The new words were:

Like a mighty tortoise
moves the church of God —
Brothers we are treading
Where we’ve always trod...

It’s not far from the mark, is it?

I've had good bechamel sauces in my time — that’s the white, creamy sauce they put in lasagna. But I can’t remember much about them, because bechamel sauce is the blandest sauce out. It exists to make food slip down more easily. It’s food lubricant.

But I still remember my first Vindaloo curry, at the New India Curry Restaurant in George Street in around 1966. Thirty–four years, and it still sticks in the memory. And I remember the extra–hot mustard at Darling Harbour in about 1987.

You couldn’t miss sauces like those. They demanded a response.

And, in the same way, the world couldn’t miss the new thing happening among the disciples. It demanded a response. And the Holy Spirit’s work still demands a response.

Do you recall Jesus’ words in Revelation?

...you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were either one or the other! So, because you are lukewarm—neither hot nor cold—I am about to vomit you out of my mouth.

The people passing where the disciples were meeting were astounded. They stopped in their tracks. We read,

When they heard this sound, a crowd came together in bewilderment, because each one heard them speaking in his own language. Utterly amazed, they asked: “Are not all these men who are speaking Galileans? Then how is it that each of us hears them in his own native language? Parthians, Medes and Elamites; residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya near Cyrene; visitors from Rome (both Jews and converts to Judaism); Cretans and Arabs—we hear them declaring the wonders of God in our own tongues!”

The world takes notice when the Spirit changes our behaviour.

THE DISCIPLES FIND BOLDNESS
Is it any wonder, then, that the disciples found boldness?

First, the Spirit came on them in an extraordinary manner, and second, people were demanding answers. What could they do, but explain it?
It is my experience that, whenever I give the Spirit freedom in my life — and there are more times when I don’t than when I do — when I give him sway, he brings people to me, for me to share the gospel with.

If we don’t experience boldness in our witness, we are behaving like the disciples before Pentecost. That means that, somehow, the Spirit has been pushed out of the controlling position in our lives.

THE GOSPEL IS PREACHED
Not everyone is called to preach. Before I responded to God’s call and let the Spirit infill me, I couldn’t preach for nuts. If you think I am bad at times, imagine all my faults added to an inability to speak in public. I was so self–conscious. I was a stammerer, and I just got worse and worse when I tried to preach.

But some people never get to be able to address groups and gatherings and crowds. Some people always speak one–on–one.

Still, whether we are preaching to thousands like Wesley or Whitefield did in the fields of England’s industrial heartland, or whether we are sitting in a coffee shop sharing Christ with a single person, we have to know how not to be a witless witness.

I wish I could do a complete analysis of Peter’s sermon here. It’s a model for proclamation of Jesus. When you have shared your experience of Jesus, then you often need to explain him to others.

In brief, Peter says,
“What you are seeing is what God planned:
Jesus is the one God sent — his works and miracles declare it.
But, as God already planned and foreknew, Jesus was handed to you to be killed.
Nevertheless, death couldn’t conquer him: he rose again as the scriptures foretold, and is alive forever.
In raising him, God declared that Jesus is both Lord and Messiah.
So repent, be baptised for the forgiveness of sins, and receive the Holy Spirit as we have already done.”

Get a pad and pencil. Analyse that sermon, so you know what to say when you are asked about your faith. But always depend on the Holy Spirit: he will help you. As Jesus said,

“When you are brought before synagogues, rulers and authorities, do not worry about how you will defend yourselves or what you will say, for the Holy Spirit will teach you at that time what you should say.”

THE CHURCH GROWS
And the last thing we see is that, when a body of believers has a real experience of the Holy Spirit, when it responds to that experience, and preaches the gospel to a watching world, then, of course, the Church grows, because people do respond to the message.

Above all, people demand that the church give them reality. We talk about reality, but we don’t much do it. So the world decides that the gospel is lies and self–deception, and turns its back and walks away.

I've told you about how repentance and refilling with the Spirit led to effective ministry through our Beach Mission team when everything had gone dry, and the ground of people’s hearts was very hard and unwelcoming to the word.

I’ve told you about how our Youth Group was touched by the Holy Spirit when the leaders repented and recommitted themselves to Christ as Lord.

When Christians get their act together before God, then the Spirit’s power is released.

And when the Spirit’s power is released, the church grows, because Jesus said,

I will build my church

and because he said,

“I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful. You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you. Remain in me, and I will remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me.
I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing."

If Jesus is the vine, then the Holy Spirit is the life–giving sap, flowing through every part.
Branches joined to the vine’s life bear fruit; branches no longer with him can do nothing.

CONCLUSION
The biggest challenge to us today is to become like the early Church. We don’t become like it just by keeping the same doctrines. We don’t become like it just by having a similar organisational structure. We become like it by a shared experience of the same Holy Spirit.

If we have confessed and dealt with our sin, if we have recommitted our lives to Jesus as Lord, if we are ready for renewal regardless of cost, then we can pray. We can pray,
“Holy Spirit, come.” We can pray, “Fill me, Lord!” We can say, “More, Lord.”
We can pray until the answer comes. We can pray together like the first believers prayed, until the power fell from heaven. We can pray and never give up.

Lord God, Holy Spirit of God, come upon us now, this day. Show us the dark places in our souls, and illuminate them by Christ our Lord, the true light.
Lord God, Holy Spirit of God, renew all your Pentecost blessings in our hearts, and grant us a passion to stay filled with your presence.
May our heavenly Father strengthen us with might in our inner being by our presence, and may we declare the good news wherever the Lord directs.
We pray this in Jesus’ name and for his sake and that of his Kingdom. AMEN