The coming of the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost was the coming of a Person. The term, “the Holy Spirit,” is the name or title of the Third Person of the Holy Trinity, and is used to distinguish Him from both the First Person, who is the Father, and from the Second Person, who is the Son. There are many other names used in Scripture to describe and designate the nature and work of the Third Person, and in every instance they refer to one and the same Person, the Holy Spirit.
Referring to the Holy Spirit as the Third Person does not imply that He is less important than the Father and the Son, but it does suggest that He is the last-revealed personality of the three. Pentecost introduced the dispensation of the Holy Spirit, and from the Book of Acts to The Revelation, the Holy Spirit functions as the direct agent between God and man. The purpose of Pentecost was to introduce Him to man in a new way.
The Holy Spirit was active before Pentecost, in the Old Testament, striving against Sin (Genesis 6:3), enduing with skill (Exodus 28:3; 31:2-5; 35:21-35), empowering for service (Judges 3:10, 34; I Samuel 10:6), and causing men to speak God’s message (Numbers 24:2; II Samuel 23:2; II Chronicles 20:14). But none of the old testament saints knew Him as the disciples learned to know Him at Pentecost. The Pentecostal Person is no less God than is God the Father, and God the Son.
The Holy Spirit came as the Third Person in the Godhead, co-equal with both the Father and the Son. He is called God (Isaiah 6:8, 9; cf. Acts 28:25, 26; Jeremiah 31:31-34; cf. Hebrews 10:15; Acts 5:1-4; II Corinthians 3:18 R.V.). The fact of His Deity is obviously clear in that He possesses the essential attributes of God. Like the Father and the Son, the Holy Spirit is eternal (Hebrews 9:14), omniscient (I Corinthians 2:9-11), omnipresent (Psalm 139:7-10) and omnipotent (Job 26:13). His coming was not simply the power of an influence; it was the presence of the living God. He had been on earth before, but now He came to stay. The Lord Jesus had said, “I will pray the Father, and He shall give you another Comforter, that He may abide with you forever” (John 14:16).
The Church was being formed and anointed by God’s eternal presence. Pentecost was the guarantee of the presence of the Holy Spirit. He came to indwell and possess the hearts of believers. We insist in placing the emphasis upon Him. What happened at Pentecost? The Spirit came.
We see a mighty unfolding in the Book of the Acts. Pagan powers are smitten, the lame are made to walk, the dead are raised to life, and thousands of souls are born anew. Never before were men possessed with so great an impulse to speak out for Christ. Never before had there been such a readiness and voluntary willingness to suffer for Christ. Never before had a group so large known such enthusiastic and intimate fellowship. The world was to witness a new thing. Rather than deny Jesus Christ or each other, the disciples chose to take their lives into their own hands and go forward in Christ’s name even unto death. Then commenced their witness in Jerusalem, branching out to Judea and Samaria, and in due course pushing out toward the uttermost part of the earth. And how did this new constraint come? There can be but one answer--the Holy Spirit had come to abide.
God’s purpose is to draw men to Himself and make them like His Son, Jesus Christ. To this end Christ gave Himself. But in so doing He did not complete the task. The process of producing God-likeness is still going on today, and it is the primary work of the Spirit to accomplish this. Undoubtedly the disciples were somewhat startled when Christ commissioned them to go forth into all the world and present His Gospel to all men. If they were bewildered at His command, they had a right to be. But He anticipated their fears and eased their burdened hearts when He added, “After that the Holy Ghost is come upon you.” At Pentecost, that is exactly what took place. The Holy Spirit came. Now, for more than nineteen hundred years, men have defied suffering, sorrow and death in order that Christ’s transforming Gospel might reach all men and fashion them into His likeness. Not all who have heard have believed, by any means. But some have and in every instance a work has been wrought, not by the disciples themselves, but by the Holy Spirit who came at Pentecost.
We need to recognize the Pentecostal Person in the ministry today. There is a prevailing impotence that none can deny, and all because the Person of the Holy Spirit is lost in a program about Him. We have emphasized the program and the personnel behind it, but we have shut out Him who alone can produce lasting results. The works of the flesh can never produce the fruit of the Spirit. The Holy Spirit is the life-line of power in the Church. The coming of the Spirit was the commencement of the Church for, says Paul, “Ye also are builded together for a habitation of God through the Spirit” (Ephesians 2:22). By the Spirit the body of Christ was formed, and by Him it is held together.
Too little attention is being given Him, and because He is not recognized there is no power in service. There is no need to pray for the Spirit to come. He is with us today. “He whom God hath sent speaketh the words of God: for God giveth not the Spirit by measure” (John 3:34). He is a Person, and we have as much of Him as did the disciples at Pentecost. When we permit the Holy Spirit to take possession of the Church today, we can expect glorious results. Let us evermore yield to Him.
The Pentecostal Phenomena
The word “phenomenon” has been defined as a strange and striking appearance of any nature; something not common, a marvel, a wonder in the external world or in a person possessing unusual powers. The day of Pentecost brought with it a demonstration of unusual power at which time there were wonders to behold. The phenomena that accompanied the Pentecostal Presence is now under consideration. The phenomena were three in number. They were signs which were the symbols of the Holy Spirit’s coming; the signs of sound, sight, and speech. The first was heard, the second was seen, and the third was both heard and seen.
There was the sign of sound. “And suddenly there came a sound from heaven as a rushing mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting” (Acts 2:2). Here we are told that the Spirit’s coming was as the wind. It was a supernatural sound, for the divine record has it that the sound came from Heaven.
Wind is one of the emblems of the Spirit. The Greek language has but one word for “wind” and “spirit,” and they mean the same thing in that language. We shall cite two biblical illustrations which show the spiritual analogy between the wind and the Spirit. In Ezekiel 37, we have the prophet’s vision of the valley of dry bones, a prophecy which has to do primarily with Israel. Ezekiel was taken by God to see a valley filled with dry bones. Then God said to him, “Son of man, can these bones live? . . . Then said He unto me, Prophesy unto the wind, prophesy, son of man, and say to the wind, Thus saith the Lord God: Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe upon these slain, that they may live. So I prophesied as He commanded, and the breath came into them, and they lived, and stood up upon their feet, an exceeding great army” (Ezekiel 37:1-10).
These four winds, which the prophet calls breath, are the divine breath of the Holy Spirit, the breath that caused the first man to live, when “the Lord God formed man of the dust of ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul” (Genesis 2:7). It is further testified to by Job, where he says, “The Spirit of God hath made me, and the breath of the Almighty hath given me life” (Job 33:4).
When the Lord Jesus explained to Nicodemus about the operation of the Holy Spirit in regeneration, He said, “The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth: so is every one that is born of the Spirit” (John 3:8).
The wind is a symbol of power, of life. It is not static. It stands for the Holy Spirit, the mightiest of all powers, apart from which no sinner, dead in trespasses and in sins, can ever be born again into the family of God. He is the energizing power that quickens men today. Apart from Him men remain spiritually dead.
There was the sign of sight. “And there appeared unto them cloven tongues like as of fire, and it sat upon each of them” (Acts 2:3). To the Jew, fire had always been a symbol of the divine presence and it is a glorious expression and illustration of the person and work of the Holy Spirit. The Scripture says, “Our God is a consuming fire” (Hebrews 12:29). He is called, “the Spirit of burning” (Isaiah 4:4). He is likened to the consuming fire which purges the wheat from the chaff (Matthew 3:11, 12). Fire is used to describe the illuminating power of the Spirit, for the seven lamps of fire burning before the throne of our Lord are called, “the seven Spirits of God” (Revelation 4:5).
The Jewish religion was made up largely of symbols, the physical things being used to symbolize the spiritual. No better symbol could have been used for the person and work of the Holy Spirit than fire. Fire illuminates, and Pentecost was to be a new revelation and illumination.
Christianity was not to begin in the dark. There is nothing vague or shady about it. As it commenced under the glory and splendor of divine light, so it has continued. That religion which has thrived on half-truth and which ingratiatingly makes its way into the minds of the unwary is not the true Christian message which came by the Spirit at Pentecost. The weakness of Modernism is not so much in what it says as in what it does not say. The true Christian message subscribes to the doctrine of Pentecost, and that is the enlightening and purifying power of the Holy Spirit. There is no room around the Pentecostal fire for religious chameleons who change color with every background. Without that Holy Fire, there never would have been the mighty results.
Recently I stood by an open fireplace. I appreciated the warmth. What a fitting symbol is fire of the Christian faith! Christianity is not cold. It warms the hearts of its adherents by the fire of the Holy Spirit. Wherever it is embraced, it kindles a new conflagration. This Pentecostal phenomenon was the doing of the Lord.
There was the sign of speech. “And they began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance” (Acts 2:4). Speech in itself would not ordinarily be classed as a marvel in the external world. Speech is common to all men. But the Pentecostal display of tongues was above the realm of nature, and all those who were present knew it. It was something uncommon to them. The gift of tongues was the first of the Pentecostal effects and the first to disappear. The crowd that gathered that day was mixed, “out of every nation under heaven” (Acts 2:5), so that they used different languages and dialects. The phenomenon occurred when, to the amazement of all, the apostles began to speak, not in the normally recognized Aramaic of the Galileans, nor even in the common language of the Jews, but in tongues which the listeners were able to understand in their own language.
The phenomenon of tongues was not permanently instituted, but it was designed for temporary purposes. We believe that God gave this gift at the time especially for the benefit of unbelieving Jews, for, says Paul, “In the law it is written, With men of other tongues and other lips will I speak unto this people; and yet for all that will they not hear Me, saith the Lord. Wherefore tongues are for a sign, not to them that believe, but to them that believe not” (I Corinthians 14:21, 22).
Three times tongues are spoken of in The Acts, and in each case it was a sign that God, in the person of the Holy Spirit, had brought the Gentiles into the Church on the same basis as the Jews. (See Acts 2:1-4; 11:15; 18:24; 19:6, 7.) Speaking in tongues was a sign of the Spirit’s presence, and such a sign was given to the whole group so that they all spoke with tongues (10:46).
Speaking of the Pentecostal phenomena, Dr. G. Campbell Morgan wrote, “These were but symbols of no value save as signs for the moment. It is necessary to observe that fact, because there is always a hunger in the carnal heart for signs. These signs were material; today we do not need them; they were needed at the commencement.”
The speaking with tongues at Pentecost was doubtless done in perfect order, without any confusion, and it was given just for the occasion. The gift was neither universal nor permanent. Dr. Arthur T. Pierson said, “Speaking in an unknown tongue is unintelligible to the hearer, is undesirable and unserviceable, it may degenerate into an empty display of the mysterious--a mere babble, if not babble, of confusion, and that such a gift acts rather as a hindrance than a help to common joint worship.” Today the Holy Spirit is indwelling Christians, seeking to exalt and magnify Jesus Christ in us. Let us not confuse the unbeliever any more than he is already bewildered, but let us seek to witness to him intelligibly and intelligently in a tongue that he knows.
The personal and practical aspect of the Spirit’s ministry is summed up in the statement, “They were all filled with the Holy Ghost.” This is the normal state, and it is commanded in Ephesians 5:18. More important than seeking after the Pentecostal phenomena is to surrender our lives to the Pentecostal Person who longs to fill us with Himself in order that we might be equipped to carry out the Great Commission.
The Pentecostal Preaching
The atmosphere was charged with tenseness. The Holy Spirit had introduced a new dispensation and the strange Power was being felt by all. The disciples now assured that this was the Comforter whom the Lord Jesus had promised to send. Now the Spirit-filled followers of Christ were under His complete control. The world would see a mighty demonstration which no man ever had witnessed before. This demonstration began when the disciples were filled with the Spirit, and it was first evidenced when they “began to speak with other tongues.” Indeed, this was the Pentecostal phenomenon, that miraculous speech should be granted to the disciples so that they might speak the wonderful message of God in dialects and languages which they themselves had not known but which were perfectly familiar and understandable to some of the hearers. This was the favorable result, and it was accomplishing the purpose of the Lord.
But there were impressions made upon unbelievers which left some amazed and perplexed. They heard and saw what went on, but they did not understand. What they heard seemed gibberish to them. They reported that the followers of the Nazarene were drunk with wine. Indeed, there was no little mental confusion among the multitudes who witnessed the Pentecostal phenomenon. In order to escape the enigma, they commenced to jeer and joke, saying, “These men are full of new wine.” Others, in their seeking hearts asked, “What meaneth this?” Then followed the first Pentecostal sermon.
We are now to see a Spirit-filled man in action. Peter was the chosen vessel to deliver the discourse. Let us look now at both the man and the message.
THE SERVANT WAS EMPOWERED
Before the Pentecostal message could be delivered, God’s messenger needed to be properly equipped. Peter was the chosen vessel to preach the Pentecostal sermon. Before Pentecost Peter was an unlikely candidate for the job. He had the gift of “gab,” but he often spoke in haste and with uncontrolled recklessness. His one asset was his aggressive nature. It seemed that he was talking most of the time. In conversation he delighted in taking the lead. He was quick-tempered and vacillating. Before Pentecost he was quite self-confident, depending more on himself than on the Lord. The world might have congratulated him for becoming a self-made man. But the man God uses is the man God makes.
At the Last Supper our Lord said to His own, “All ye shall be offended because of me this night.” Immediately Peter replied, “Though all men shall be offended because of thee, yet wilt I never be offended” (Matthew 26:31-33). At that point our Lord predicted the shameful cowardice of the self-confident Peter, saying, “Verily I say unto thee, That this night, before the cock crow thou shalt deny me thrice” (vs. 34). In spite of Christ’s prediction, Peter persisted, “Though I should die with thee, yet will I not deny thee” (vs. 35).
Foolish Peter! If only he had known his own weakness! A few hours after that conversation with Jesus, Peter forsook and denied his Lord (vss. 69-75). It has happened often that the very sins for which we condemn others, and which we boast will never overtake us, cause our downfall.
The believer who is empowered for service must lose confidence in self and depend wholly upon the Lord. The plain teaching of Scripture is that the flesh is weak (Mark 14:38) and infirmed (Romans 6:19), and that we are to put no confidence in it (Philippians 3:3), nor make provision for it (Romans 13:14). We dare not trust ourselves. We need to learn that “it is better to trust in the Lord than to put confidence in man” (Psalm 118:8). The man of wisdom has said, “The Lord shall be thy confidence” (Proverbs 3:26). If we hope to be used of God, our confidence must be toward Him (I John 3:21), and in Christ (I John 5:14). The mighty Apostle Paul was greatly used of the Lord because he had learned in whom to place confidence. He could say, “Being confident of this very thing, that He which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ” (Philippians 1:6). The Christian worker is confident that, as he works, the Lord must work through him. The confident expectation of every true servant of Christ is in the power of the Holy Spirit. The self-confident Peter of the past was in no condition to deliver the Pentecostal sermon.
But Peter was to experience a change, and it was that change which empowered him for the holy task. Such empowering is the work of the Holy Spirit. The first great demonstration of Pentecostal preaching was an exhibition and illustration of the Spirit’s power, a necessary spiritual qualification for bearing witness to Jesus Christ. Peter stands forth as an example of what the Holy Spirit will do with the servant who is fully yielded to Him. All through the Book of the Acts and the Epistles, the Holy Spirit is the Presence and the Power in true service. All results were accomplished by Him. This is the marked feature in the history of the Christian Church. One purpose in Christ sending the Holy Spirit was to equip the disciples for the work. He said to them, “Ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you” (Acts 1:8). He had given them the Great Commission, but without the power of the Holy Spirit, they were inefficient to execute it.
Our Lord said many fine things to Peter, but none of His sayings were more important than that which He uttered to Peter and to the rest. “Tarry ye in the city of Jerusalem, until ye be endued with power from on high” (Luke 24:49). We need to be clothed upon with power if we are to engage ourselves in aggressive spiritual work. Like Peter, we must be filled with the Spirit if we plan to go forth to serve Christ. No doubt to “tarry” went hard with the impulsive, enthusiastic apostle, but he did it. So did the rest of the disciples. There was an unlimited field of service. It was to be worldwide--“into all the world” (Mark 16:15), “unto the uttermost part of the earth” (Acts 1:8). Such a tremendous task could never be accomplished without the special endowment from Heaven. We need to be filled with the Spirit.
We are not specialists when it comes to this matter of waiting upon the Lord. But a necessary part of the equipment with which to reach men for God is first to reach God for men. He who does not pause before the Throne of God is in danger of becoming mechanical, and the most mechanical person is not of necessity the most practical. The practical servant of the Lord does God’s work in God’s way by the power of God’s Spirit. Peter could not be Christ’s witness without the Spirit’s preparation. Neither can we. Let us ask ourselves if we are witnesses, born again and empowered by the Spirit. We have not yet begun to serve Him until this is so.
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