On Him and on Us

Acts 2:22-36

Goal: That the Spirit be poured out on the hearers to motivate for mission in the joy of their salvation.

Introduction: A medical technician was asked about his most unusual emergency experience. He chose to tell about a call from an usher at a Lutheran church. The usher said, “A man slumped over in the pew during the sermon, and we think he’s dead.” He relates, “When we got to the church, the preacher was still preaching so we carried the man out as quietly as we could.” “What’s so unusual about that?” he was asked. He replied, “We carried out four men before we found the one that was dead.” . . . Now, I don’t expect anything like that to happen today. Nevertheless, ushers, if you see someone slumping in the pew, check for sleep before you call 911.

When Peter preached as the Spirit “enabled” him on Pentecost, it is doubtful that anyone fell asleep. Through his preaching, the Spirit gripped the hearts of many. More than 3,000 people believed and were baptized that very day. Man, wouldn’t it be great to have something like that happen here? But can it?

Doesn’t it make you wonder what Peter might have said or done that caused so many people to rejoice in the Spirit of the Living God?

Was it the man’s charisma?

Was it the man’s oratorical skills?

Was it the man’s super-dynamic persuasive personality?

I don’t think it was any of those things. It didn’t come from Peter at all.

When Peter preached that first Pentecost, he didn’t speak about how the disciples would evangelize the whole world, or do great things for God. Instead, speaking as the Holy Spirit gave him utterance, the spear of God’s law was driven deep into the hearts of the people. Verse 23 says,

“This man (speaking of Jesus) was handed over to you by God’s set purpose and foreknowledge; and you, with the help of wicked men, put him to death.”

While “wicked (evil) men” certainly played a part in Jesus’ suffering, it is interesting to see that it was by the Father’s own purpose and foreknowledge that his Son was sacrificed.

Why did He do that? He did it because sin had to be atoned for in sinful man. And just as Scripture says,

“God made him (Jesus) who had no sin to be sin for us (in our place) so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.” (2 Cor 5:21)

So it came about just as Isaiah had prophesied,

“We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way; and the Lord has laid on him (Jesus) the iniquity (the guilt) of us all” (Is 53:6).

I don’t know if you caught that, but do you see where you and I fit into this picture? We are among the guilty, among those called “wicked”. What, then, could any of us possibly do that could please God? The answer is, of course, nothing. Like Peter, there is nothing we can do that pleases God except for one thing, (Pause) … the Holy Spirit.

And that Spirit of God has come to us because Jesus is no longer dead. He is alive!

“God raised him from the dead, freeing him from the agony of death, because it was impossible for death to keep its hold on him” (v 24).

Peter concludes his sermon by announcing the Father’s exaltation of his Son.

“Exalted to the right hand of God, he has received from the Father the promised Holy Spirit and has poured out what you now see and hear.”

What the people saw was ordinary men like themselves. They didn’t see men upon whom the Holy Spirit had been poured. What they heard was not from drunken men as they supposed. What they heard was the rushing breath of the Holy Spirit in fulfillment of the prophetic words of Joel,

“In the last days, God says, I will pour out my Spirit on all people. Your sons and daughters will prophesy, your young men will see visions, your old men will dream dreams. Even on my servants, both men and women, I will pour out my Spirit in those days, and they will prophesy.”

Because this message of Jesus Christ is true, the heavenly Father now pours out on us blessing upon blessing. Out of His divine purpose and foreknowledge He now comes to us with a promise,

“I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”

And his presence with us brings spiritual gifts and knowledge of the Holy One.

But oh how we 21st century Christians like to take this for granted. We show ourselves to live more in keeping with the world and our sinful nature than we do the Spirit of the Living God. Why is that?

It is because our sinful nature seeks to have its own way over-against the way of the Spirit of the Living God, and that happens, because our faith is so weak.

How do I know this?

I know it by our lack of learning and spiritual understanding.

I know it by our lack of commitment to the functioning of the body of Christ.

I know it by our lack of concern about our own absence from worship and bible study and those things through which the Spirit of God has chosen to work.

I know it because I struggle with it myself.

I know it because it is the same as putting Christ to death all over again, and I am convicted by the Spirit of God working through the law that says.

“If we deliberately keep on sinning after we have received the knowledge of the truth, no sacrifice for sins is left, but only a fearful expectation of judgment and of raging fire that will consume the enemies of God. Anyone who rejected the law of Moses died without mercy on the testimony of two or three witnesses. How much more severely do you think a man deserves to be punished who has trampled the Son of God under foot, who has treated as an unholy thing the blood of the covenant that sanctified him, and who has insulted the Spirit of grace?” (Hebrews 10:26-29 NIV).

We are behaving just like those people to whom Peter preached on that first Pentecost.

We are just like those people who sleep while the Spirit of God seeks them out.

We ask, “Where are the young people in our church?” Have we not yet seen what we have taught our young?

We have taught them to commit to the world and its business and pleasures at the expense of Christ. Why should they come here?

You and I have done this by our own bad example.

You and I still have that evil and wicked nature in us that seeks to trample the Son of God underfoot.

And you and I will pay the consequence for it. (Pause)

… Except for one thing, The Spirit of the Living God.

The Spirit still touches us through the water and word of Holy Baptism.

The Spirit still touches us through the written and spoken Word of Christ.

The Spirit still touches us through friends who talk to us about the hope that is within us, Christ Jesus.

The Spirit still touches us, in the Body and Blood of God’s own Son Jesus Christ.

The Spirit still touches us with God’s eternal blessings in so many ways that it’s hard to even list all the blessings. And still, we hardly take notice or give mention of all these things.

Has God died so that there is nothing to say? No!

Was Christ left to decay in the grave so that we have no hope? No!

Did God exclude us from the outpouring of His Spirit so we cannot know Him or His Word? No! If the answer to these questions is “NO” then where are we? Where is our confidence, our faith, our trust, our hope? Is it not in him who says,

“Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age." (Matthew 28:19-20 NIV)

Dearest friends, and beloved children of the Father, can you see in Peter the confidence we also receive through faith? Can you hear the joy of the Psalmist emanating from deep within our hearts in sacred song, singing?

“Therefore my heart is glad and my tongue rejoices; my body also will live in hope, because you will not abandon me to the grave” (vv 26-27).

Oh how blessed is the name of the Lord our God. For it is by His beloved Servant Jesus Christ, that we see and hear the things of God, because God’s Spirit lives among us and in us.

So let us not live as if we are asleep in death, or as those who lack faith, because the Spirit has been poured out, On Him and on Us. Amen.