And there came suddenly out of the heaven a sound as of a bearing violent breath, and it filled all the house where they were sitting,
And there appeared to them divided tongues, as it were of fire; it sat also upon each one of them,
And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit, and began to speak with other tongues, according as the Spirit was giving them to declare” (Act 2:2-4 YLT).
Exactly ten days had passed since the Lord ascended into heaven from Mount Olives. It was also fifty days after He rose from the dead. And on this day, the disciples were gathered in Jerusalem as He had commanded them to. They had just gone through the traumatic experience of His crucifixion and death; although He had told them before it happened, it still took them by surprise because they did not really think it could happen. But when they saw Him arrested, humiliated, tortured, and crucified, sorrow had filled their hearts.
Then the impossible happened. He rose from the dead, just as He said He would. He had told them on several occasions how He would be killed and on the third day He would rise from the dead, but this had fallen on deaf ears. They heard what He said, but the information did not really sink into them. So when Mary Magdalene, Joanna, and Mary the mother of James came early on the resurrection morning with the news that the Lord had risen from the dead, “Their words seemed to them as idle tales, and they believed them not” (Luke 24:11).
Afterwards, the Lord Himself appeared to several of them on many occasions. He appeared to two of them on the way to Emmaus. On another occasion, He came in unto another group through locked doors where they were hiding for the fear of the Jews. And He said unto them, “Peace be unto you: as my Father hath sent me, even so send I you” (John 20:21). He showed them His hands and His side, and they were extremely glad.
They saw Him breaking bread as His manner was. They heard Him teach again, speaking to them things pertaining to the kingdom. The eleven disciples went ahead of Him into Galilee, unto the mountain where He had chosen to meet with them. There, He spoke to them and gave them His authority to go forth and preach:
“All authority hath been given unto me in heaven and on earth. Go ye therefore, and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them into the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit: teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I commanded you: and lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world” (Mat 28:18-20).
For forty days, He was with them, until the day He ascended up into heaven. While He was with them, He commanded them not to leave Jerusalem, but to wait for the promise of the Father that He had previously told them about.
“When they, therefore, were come together, they asked of him, saying, Lord, wilt thou at this time restore again the kingdom to Israel? And he said unto them; It is not for you to know the times or the seasons, which the Father hath put in his own power.
But ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you: and ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judaea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth.
And when he had spoken these things, while they beheld, he was taken up; and a cloud received him out of their sight. And while they looked stedfastly toward heaven as he went up, behold, two men stood by them in white apparel;
Which also said, Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven? this same Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven” (Act 1:6-10).
So they obeyed. They all stayed in Jerusalem, not knowing what to expect. And when the day of Pentecost arrived, they gathered in the upper room.
This day in question was a feast day in Israel. It was one of the three great feasts of the Lord: the Feast of Harvest or Pentecost.
The three great annual feasts of the Lord in Israel’s worship are described in considerable details in Exodus and Leviticus. These feasts typify and prefigure the whole church age beginning with the Cross and reaching its conclusion at the glorious manifestation of the Sons of God spoken of by the Holy Ghost through the mouth of His holy prophets. These feasts, therefore, begin with Passover, and end with Tabernacles; and in between we have the various steps and degrees by which the church is brought out of death into life, out of rejection into exaltation, and out of suffering into the everlasting Kingdom.
The Feast of Pentecost, also called the Feast of First Fruits or the Feast of Weeks, falls on the fiftieth day after the Passover Sabbath. This feast is a reminder, a guarantee from God of His power to produce spiritual fruit in the field of human salvation. The literal first fruits of the soil are merely the physical expressions of the real first fruits of the Holy Spirit. The first fruits of the Holy Spirit are the true believers won to God by His Son on this memorable day in Jerusalem.
This breathtaking experience is recorded in the second chapter of Acts. It was the day that the early harvest, a kind of “first fruits,” was celebrated by Israel and the agricultural community. But even greater than this, God Almighty chose that day to bring forth the “first fruits” of believers from the earth. These being the first fruits represents a pledge from God that a full harvest, an even greater outpouring of divine power, is scheduled for the near future, when the main harvest of human beings will be gathered in. This will be during the Feast of Ingathering.
And when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all with one accord in one place.
And suddenly there came a sound from heaven as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting.
And there appeared unto them cloven tongues like as of fire, and it sat upon each of them.
And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance (Acts 2:1-4).
Let it be known that at Pentecost, these men and women were baptized with the Holy Ghost and with fire. They were filled with the Holy Ghost and baptized with fire. For as they gathered in the upper room, cloven tongues like fire appeared unto them, and sat upon each of them. From then on, a fire burned within them. They were never the same again.
As we discussed above, the physical presence of the Lord Jesus was so important to the twelve that they were filled with deep sorrow when He told them that He would leave them. In the Gospel of John we read, “But now I go to him that sent me, and none of you asketh me, Whither goest thou? But because I have said these things to you, sorrow hath filled your heart” (John 16:5,6).
They were filled with consternation and greatly troubled at the thought that He was really going to leave them. If you looked at their faces, what would you have seen? They looked like scared kids who were just told to prepare to become orphans.
Then He turned to them and spoke concerning the promise of the Holy Spirit, whom He called the Comforter. He knew very well what they really needed at this hour of sorrow. He continued:
“Nevertheless, I tell you the truth: It is expedient for you that I depart; for if I go not away, the Comforter will not come to you; but if I depart, I will send him to you “(John 16:7).
At this point, they probably didn’t believe what they were hearing. He said, “It is better for you, or it is to your advantage that I go away.” “How can that be to our advantage?” they were probably thinking. They were essentially mourning on the inside that He was leaving them, and then He told them it was to their advantage that He was going away.
The Lord Jesus was telling these distraught disciples that if He did not return to the Father who sent Him, the Holy Spirit would not come. His going away would mean the coming of the Spirit, and He told them plainly that it was better for them that the Spirit should come and remain with them. Wonderful was His presence and ministry among them, yet far more blessed and wonderful would be the presence and ministry of the Holy Spirit within them.”I will pray the Father”, He assured them, “and he will give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you forever;
Even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and will be in you. I will not leave you comfortless; I will come to you” (Joh 14:16-18 Webster).
“These things have I spoken to you, being yet present with you.
But the Comforter, who is the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance, whatever I have said to you” (Joh 14:25,26 Webster).
It is only the Holy Spirit, the Anointing, that can teach and lead you into the Truth. Neither the world nor the popular church in the world can lead you into the truth. In the case of the truth of God, the majority is not always right. In fact, more often than not, the majority misses it. And what the majority declares as heresy may even be the solid truth. This was the case in the experience of the first Apostles. The Sanhedrin and the council of Scribes and Pharisees considered these firebrands to be heretics. They were only a few of them to start with: probably about a score, counting the disciples, the women that believed, and some other secret believers. What these few Christians were proclaiming was different from the orthodox doctrine of the day. They were therefore considered heretics or people holding to a false doctrine. But were they?
The Apostle Paul was persecuted for decades and thrown into prison for preaching and teaching what the religious system of his day considered heresy. His message and teachings were completely contrary to what the mainstream religious system believed, and so he was indicted for peddling “false doctrine.” But was he?
An account regarding this is recorded in the twenty-fourth chapter of Acts. Here, Ananias the high priest and several Jewish elders arrested Paul with the intention to put him to death. They brought him to Felix the governor. These men described Apostle Paul as “a pestilent fellow, and a mover of sedition among all the Jews throughout the world, and a ringleader of the sect of the Nazarenes: who also hath gone about to profane the temple: whom we took, and would have judged according to our law” (Acts 24:5, 6).
Answering for himself with regards to the accusation of heresy and sedition, Paul said to the governor, “But this I confess unto thee, that after the way which they call heresy, so worship I the God of my fathers, believing all things which are written in the law and in the prophets” (Acts 24:14).
Just because the majority of men, denominations of religious men, or even a committee of highly acclaimed preachers declared a message of Scripture to be heresy, does not make it so. The final word belongs to the Holy Ghost, the Teacher, the Anointing, whom the Father sent to us in His Name. He is the only one who can pontificate with regards to the truth. He is the one and only Pontiff; all others are pretenders.
This is so true in our day. You can go on the internet and search for what some define as heresy, or visit some large global denomination and examine what they believe and what they declare as heresy, and depending on your personal intimacy with the Holy Spirit, you may be amazed. I once checked up on this, and the list of “false doctrine teachers” I found included almost all of the true men and women of God I knew.
In some circles, anyone who believes in divine healing is a heretic. In others, if you believe in or speak in tongues, you’re not only a heretic, but a lunatic. If you claim that God speaks to you and that you experience the supernatural, you’re a fanatical heretic. And whatever you do, don’t even think of following the Holy Ghost if that isn’t the popular opinion of the religious order of your time. Don’t even dare.
Yes, the Scripture says, “Ye shall receive power after the Holy Spirit is come upon you,” but it is tragic that the majority of Christians think of this power only in terms of some external wonder-working ability for service. They dream of a fantastic baptism that will give them the power to perform prime-time Channel 9 news miracles, like raising the dead on Broad Street. This is the image that this passage of Scripture creates in their minds. So they go seeking the baptism, hoping to see signs and wonders follow their ministry. Very few Christians consider or even notice the many more important offices and supernatural manifestations of the Holy Spirit in our lives.
In our lifelong search for truth, why do we run from coast to coast, from prophet to prophet, and from counselor to counselor in search of answers, when the Spirit of Truth, the Counselor Himself, is resident within us? Why have we not learned that the divine supernatural Person that dwells in and with us is the Spirit of Truth? And that one of His principal and exclusive ministries is to lead and guide us into all truth? And that He is the ONLY one who can do this work accurately?
Have we never read the admonition from John the beloved saying, “But the anointing which ye have received of him abideth in you, and ye need not that any man teach you: but as the same anointing teacheth you of all things, and is truth, and is no lie, and even as it hath taught you, ye shall abide in him” (1 John 2:27)?
Do we not believe that the Anointing can teach us all things? Do we fail to believe that this Spirit of Truth can show us things to come? Do we not believe that He cannot lie, and that we find absolute truth only in Him? Can’t we hear the sage in the Old Testament saying, “There is a spirit in man: and the inspiration of the Almighty giveth them understanding” (Job 32:8)?
But we must also learn that the indwelling Spirit may not be able to teach a cold, sluggish, lazy, and double-minded soul. For “as a door turneth upon its hinges, so the sluggard turns upon his bed” (Prov 26:14). “A double-minded person is unstable in all his ways” (James 1:8). A man cannot expect to be taught of God if he fails to give himself time to be alone with Him. How can the slothful man expect to receive inspiration from the Holy Ghost if he fails to spend time in communion with Him? He must set time apart to look into His face, away from the crowd, away from religious activities, away from church organizations and programs, and alone with the Spirit of Truth and Grace.
How can he expect to hear from God if he does not wait on Him in the silence of his soul? And how can he expect to hear from God when his flesh is always satisfied in every detail, his stomach always full, and his flesh always put before the spirit?
Today, more than ever before, we need to practice prayer and fasting. If the saints before us considered it impossible to hear from God and develop intimacy with Him without it, we need it even more. Many of us are not healthy in our spiritual walk because we lack this proper nourishment that only the Spirit can give. Some of us are cold, while many are lukewarm. We cannot become hot and remain fervent unless we practice entering into His presence and being face to face with Him whose eyes are as a flame of fire.