Acts - Week 1 / Wednesday

Reading for today: Acts 2:1-13

Pentecost was a harvest festival among the Jews. In the Old
Testament it was referred to as the Feast of Weeks because there was
a week of weeks (7 weeks) between this festival and Passover. That's
where the name comes from, "Pentecost" meaning 50.

Ten days have now passed since the ascension of Jesus, and the 120
disciples (both men and women) are still together in that upper
room, waiting and praying. That in itself is pretty remarkable
obedience! But that obedience is about to be rewarded.

First of all, a sound like a violently blowing wind filled the room.
And then they saw what appeared to be tongues of fire that separated
and came to rest on each of them. Now, it is interesting that these
2 physical phenomena appear in conjunction with the Holy Spirit only
this one time. From here on, throughout the rest of the book of
Acts, when the Holy Spirit was poured out on people, these 2
phenomena do not take place.

And then all of the 120 were filled with the Holy Spirit, and as a
result they began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit enabled
them. Now, this particular phenomenon is repeated throughout the
book of Acts whenever people were filled with the Holy Spirit. In
fact, it still is to be the expected happening today when believers
are filled with the Holy Spirit.

In this particular outpouring of the Holy Spirit, the 120 disciples
who spoke in other tongues were heard by the crowd that had gathered
to be speaking in languages that they understood! Many had come from
other nations to celebrate this festival, and now they hear the
"locals" speaking in languages that they recognize as their own. But
how did these people know those languages? Obviously, they didn't!
They were simply speaking what the Holy Spirit enabled them to speak.

This amazed the crowd. They started questioning how this could
happen. But some in the crowd thought they had the answer: these
people were speaking this "nonsense" because they were drunk!

Somebody needed to explain what was going on. But who will dare to
speak to such a throng as this?

Tomorrow: The "wimp" of yesterday becomes the "powerhouse" of today