The Fire We Want (Acts 1-2)

In Sermons, The Whole Story, Year 2024 by harvest.admin

Resource by Derrick DeLain

Go and Proclaim

Flying to KL for the first time…I had never been to California…Looking out and seeing how dry it is and it hit me, if you are not familiar with California, there are several wildfires that catch and spread every year, but it hit me no wonder why that happens.

I think back to just a few years ago in 2020 where a small campfire ignited a spark that would go on to cause one of the worst wildfires in history in California. It started off manageable but the right conditions existed: strong winds, dry brush, high temperatures. The fire rapidly grew causing devastation across thousands of acres.

In Acts 1-2, we see a similar pattern. It started with a small group of disciples waiting and praying together when, like a spark, the Holy Spirit comes on them igniting a spiritual fire within them that would go on to spread and thousands of people would be impacted in one day.

Like the fires in California, this fire would expand no just reaching Jerusalem where they were, but eventually the entire world, across generations, that would impact every single one of us in this room.

As you guys have been walking through the Bible this year, we come to a spot that has great impact on our lives even more than 2,000 years later.

Four major things are happening in Acts 1-2 that I want to quickly point to that will shape the rest of our time together. Major thing number 1? Jesus ascends back to heaven. Jesus spent some forty days with His disciples after he rose from the grave showing that He had power over sin and death.

But right before he ascends, He gives them one last lesson found in Acts 1:8…Acts 1:8–11 (ESV) — 8 But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.” 9 And when he had said these things, as they were looking on, he was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight. I always found this so funny. He’s talking to them and as He’s talking, He just starts levitating and then disappears and they are just looking up like “what just happened?” Don’t believe me? Look at verse 10 10 And while they were gazing into heaven as he went, behold, two men stood by them in white robes, 11 and said, “Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into heaven? This Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven.”

See? So the first major thing that happens is that Jesus ascends back to heaven.

The second major thing that happens in these chapters is the coming of the Holy Spirit. Jesus told them that it was going to be better for them for Him to leave and that the Holy Spirit was going to come to them which happens in chapter 2 starting at verse 2 Acts 2:2–4 (ESV) — 2 And suddenly there came from heaven a sound like a mighty rushing wind, and it filled the entire house where they were sitting. 3 And divided tongues as of fire appeared to them and rested on each one of them. 4 And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance.

We’re going to talk about the effects that the Holy Spirit has on us later on but what we see here right now is a supernatural act of God promised to the disciples by Jesus.

I am going to leave, but when I leave, you will receive power so that you will be my witnesses which leads us to the third major thing we see, people trusting in Jesus. Look at what happens as these disciples are filled with the Holy Spirit.

5 There were Jews living in Jerusalem, devout men from every nation under heaven. 6 When this sound occurred, a crowd came together and was confused because each one heard them speaking in his own language. 7 And they were astounded and amazed, saying, “Look, aren’t all these who are speaking Galileans? 8 How is it that each of us can hear in our own native language?

What do they hear exactly? For 22 verses, Peter preaches to them the reality of OT scriptures pointing to the truth of who Jesus is and what He has done for them, and the result? Jump to verse 37

37 Now when they heard this they were cut to the heart, and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, “Brothers, what shall we do?” 38 And Peter said to them, “Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. 39 For the promise is for you and for your children and for all who are far off, everyone whom the Lord our God calls to himself.” 40 And with many other words he bore witness and continued to exhort them, saying, “Save yourselves from this crooked generation.” 41 So those who received his word were baptized, and there were added that day about three thousand souls.

3,000 individuals came to know Jesus. Which then leads us to the fourth major thing that happens in this section: a new family is created

Acts 2:42–47 (ESV) — 42 And they devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers. 43 And awe came upon every soul, and many wonders and signs were being done through the apostles. 44 And all who believed were together and had all things in common. 45 And they were selling their possessions and belongings and distributing the proceeds to all, as any had need. 46 And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts, 47 praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved.

Jesus goes back to heaven. The Holy Spirit comes. People are saved. A new family is created. In a short amount of time, lives are forever changed, like a wildfire. Well, what does this have to do with us this morning? Family, everything!

Jesus is returning one day and we cannot wait, Amen? But until that time comes, He has invited us to share the truth of what He has done for people to people. And it begins with the gospel…

The Beautiful Gospel

The disciples witnessed Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection with their own eyes. To them, He wasn’t another prophet with another religious message; he was God himself, on a rescue mission to save the world.

If Jesus had really died a sacrificial death in the place of sinners, there weren’t multiple ways to get to God. If there were, why would he have put his Son through that on the cross? Jesus had said “I am the way, the truth and the life, nobody comes to the Father but through me…” because there was no other way, the disciples believed him.

They believed that Jesus was who He said He was. Why? They had seen His ministry. They saw He had risen from the dead victoriously. They believed that He died for them personally. This proved to them beyond any doubt that he was who said he was.

They believed that if this were true, that this was the greatest act of grace ever imagined: The Creator, dying for his rebellious creation. And, if all this were true, this was a God so beautiful and so glorious that he was worth talking about! That they would willingly give away their whole lives for this. He deserved to have His glory to be spread among all peoples of the earth.

Now, let’s take off their shoes and put on ours. Do we believe in the beauty of Jesus the same way? Do you have a grasp of your sin? Do you understand how in need you are to be forgiven?

I think we often fall into two categories when it comes to our sin. 1. We don’t think our sin is that offensive. That we somehow believe that if we do enough good things or fast or pray the right amount of times, that God will accept us. But inside of us, even with doing all of those “good” things, there’s a bit of doubt in us where we ask, what if I didn’t do enough.

Can I confirm something for you, when the time comes, you didn’t do enough. It’s like this, if I were to offer you a glass of milk and I told you that it was good to drink, but the animal it came from had a life threatening disease in it that contaminated the milk and could possibly kill you if you drank it, but at the same time, we aren’t 100% sure of the outcome. Would you drink the milk? No. Even if it was a droplet, we know that there’s a possibility it could still harm us.

If we wouldn’t drink the milk, why do we think a holy God would accept our good deeds and half hearted fasts if theres a small level of falsehood in them? That’s because we don’t think our sin is that offensive.

We think somehow it’s up to us and we compare ourselves to others and think, well, I’m not as bad as that person so I’ll be ok. The Bible tells us that there is nobody who is righteous enough. That we have all fallen short of bringing glory to God. If that’s true, then even in your good deeds, you still fail. So you assume, your sin isn’t that bad. You’ve assumed wrong.

The second way some of us think, is we think we are too far gone to experience God’s grace to us. I’ll be honest, there aren’t a lot of people who fall in this category but there are still some that assume God could never forgive me because of the things I have done or the things I have thought. We question ourselves regularly.

I need you to hear me say this, no matter which side you are one…your sin is very offensive, but you can never out sin the grace of Jesus towards you. That’s what’s so beautiful about the gospel. Grace is only amazing when you realize you need it in the first place. When you have experienced it your response should be one of gratitude and worship and praise!

The disciples conviction was that Jesus had died as a substitute for sinners. And when they dragged these Apostles in front of the authorities during that time and the authorities told them that if they didn’t stop talking about Jesus they would kill them, they said to them “Well, you gotta do what you’re going to do but I have to remain faithful to our Savior.” Why? Because they believed in the power of the gospel.

Here’s my question for you: Do you believe? Has it captured you until you can’t stop talking about it, are you willing to go anywhere with it, and to give up anything for it? This beautiful gospel?

That seems impossible to think about, I know, but if you know Jesus here today, you need to remember something: you are operating in this, not in your own power, but His. Second thing I want to show us today is this: The Spirit’s Power

What did Jesus tell them in verse 8? But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.”

That word power there is dunamas where we get the word dynamite from. This dynamic power produced something phenomenal in the life of the early church. The Holy Spirit is moving and leading the church is following.

Guys, there have been books on books written about the Holy Spirit and what He does in the life of a follower of Jesus. In fact, you guys could probably have an entire sermon series on the Holy Spirit. So for the sake of time, this is what I want to draw your attention to.

It wasn’t until the Holy Spirit came that the mission of God went forward. What does that communicate to us today? We cannot be part of the mission of God until we have tapped into the power of the Spirit of God.

I remember my son, who is turning 11 in December, years ago trying to pour himself milk into his cereal bowl. Now my son is really skinny, he maybe has .02% body fat on him. This little guy who was maybe 6 or 7 at the time was struggling to carry the gallon of milk over to the counter, which he could barely even see over, to pour himself milk.

Now I was watching him and I knew it was going to be a mess but he was determined to do it. As he was lifting it up he was struggling and reality hit him. He knew he wasn’t going to succeed so, he looked at me and said, “dad this is too heavy, I need your help.” To which I was ok with stepping in because milk is expensive and nobody wants to clean up a mess early in the morning.

What’s the point? Michael knew he had the chance to rely on a power greater than himself to get the job done. Write this down: the mission of God only happens when we are helped with a power stronger than ourselves.

Hearing something like this should encourage us because that means seeing people trust Jesus, though we have a role to play, it doesn’t rely on us completely. I’ll explain what I mean by that shortly.

But here is the takeaway…if you know Jesus you have the Holy Spirit inside of you. It’s not a maybe. It’s not kinda. You have Him. Jesus said in the book of John that He needed to leave so that His followers could experience the presence and power of the Holy Spirit.

His presence is His comfort for us in difficult times while we are still here on earth. His presence is His bringing to mind gospel truth that we need to comfort our broken hearts. His presence is felt through other brothers and sisters who encourage us and exercise the one anothers of scripture to us. His power though, His power comes from when we are praying to our God and asking Him to move for our good and His glory. His power seals us and guards us until we see Jesus face to face.

His power is to be able to give you the ability to speak about the truth of Jesus to those who need to hear it. Individuals filled with the Spirit proclaim a gospel to all people

How is your proclamation of the gospel? Do you believe that the Holy Spirit is empowering you to share? The deeper question is this: do you have the Holy Spirit at all?

If you don’t learn from Michael. Ask for help…It starts with recognizing your need for a Savior…ask for help. Ask Him to save you from your sins. Ask Him to cleanse you from that unrighteousness that you have. Ask Him to empower you to be the person you were created to be. And after you know without a doubt, that He has saved you and forgiven you of your sins, share that truth with others!

We need to recognize that the people we know, that family member or that person you work with won’t understand the reality of their sin or their need for Jesus without them hearing about it, potentially, more than likely from you. Guess what, when you recognize that, you still get an opportunity to ask for help. “Lord, give me the words to say to my friend about you.” “Lord, give me the courage to boldly talk about you in a way that’s meaningful to them.”

Ask for help, when you do, you have a helper who is ready to empower you towards obedience. You have a God who answers prayers. You have a Savior who wants to save. Which leads me to this, when we ask for help…

The Nations Are Reached

5 There were Jews living in Jerusalem, devout men from every nation under heaven. 6 When this sound occurred, a crowd came together and was confused because each one heard them speaking in his own language. 7 And they were astounded and amazed, saying, “Look, aren’t all these who are speaking Galileans? 8 How is it that each of us can hear in our own native language? 9 Parthians, Medes, Elamites; those who live in Mesopotamia, in Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, 10 Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya near Cyrene; visitors from Rome, both Jews and proselytes, 11 Cretans and Arabs—we hear them speaking the magnificent acts of God in our own languages.”

This is a miracle! These tongues were actually other human languages. There were people there from all over the world and you had listeners saying “I understand what you are saying! You are telling me about the gospel in my own language” even though you don’t know my language. It is a miracle.

Why is this significant? Well, in Gen 15 and 17, God tells Abraham that he was going to be the father of many nations. However in Gen 9 when Noah and his sons got off the ark one of the very first things God told them was to “be fruitful and multiply, fill the earth”

However, when we get to Gen 11:4 at the tower of babel you see the people say “Nah we ain’t doing that. We’re gonna build.” In fact, their building was direct disobedience to what God told Noah and his children. They said, let’s build here “less we dispersed over the face of the earth.” So what did God do? He used tongues to confuse them to force their hand, group up, and head out. God used their sin to push them to do what He commanded in the first place.

You see, God used different languages to disperse the people of the world to fulfill what He commanded, to fill the earth with image bearers. God never desired to see separation happen, He desired obedience.

And now we find ourselves in Acts 2. What confused the people in Gen 11 is what brings them together in Acts. Why is this important to know? I share that to say this, if we spend time focusing on the miracle of tongues being used, we miss out on the purpose of why the miracle had to take place. God was starting to finally fulfill His promise to Abraham back in Gen 15 and 17. That He would be the father of many nations. That through Him, people from every tribe tongue and nation would be part of God’s forever family.

The first time the gospel was preached, it was preached in all languages SIMULTANEOUSLY. The gospel. An experience of the gospel that is pushing them to proclaim the gospel to others.

Tim Keller once said that “If the apostles had only spoken in Greek or Aramaic or Hebrew the signal would have been set that the gospel was primarily for one people group. BUT instead the Lord on Pentecost shows the world through a deliberate miracle that no language and no culture has privilege over the other in the kingdom of God. Isn’t that beautiful? The gospel is for every tongue, tribe, people, and nation! The first worship service is multi-lingual, multi-cultural, multi-racial in the extreme!” [1]

And these individuals became a dedicated family. We could preach an entire sermon on Acts 2:42-47, but the thing I want to highlight is this, when these individuals came to know Jesus, they dedicated themselves to Jesus and to each other. They became family.

That means people who were part of different nations, people who they would normally treat as outcast because of the color of their skin or their cultural background. They would ignore that and say, these people are my family people even though we may be different, the thing we have in common is that we were both sinners in need of a Savior. And because we know this Savior now together, I have more in common with them now than I do my own flesh and blood.

And the people around them noticed. Which is why we see, it say at the end of verse 47 47 praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved.

They could see them and tell a difference with who they were and what they did and those on the outside looking in said, I want they have. I need what they have.

This beautiful Gospel would go forth like a wildfire to Jerusalem, Judea, and the ends of the earth. To reach a 16 year old boy in North Carolina, who would grow up to come and visit his friend in Kuala Lumpur, to preach the gospel to encourage believers who caught that fire for themselves, to reach people who are around them who have yet to catch the flame.

For those in this room who know Jesus, let me encourage you this morning. God has empowered you through His Spirit to talk about Jesus. It may seem like a difficult task, it may be dangerous, but loved on, you are not alone. He is forever with you and whatever you may lose on this side of eternity, you gain that much more in the presence of Jesus when you see Him face to face.

To those in here who may not know Jesus yet. I know you have questions and doubts and you may feel like you need answers to your questions, but I want to encourage you with something, sometimes you just simply need to trust.

It’s like this, when you came in here this morning, you sat down in the chair you are in right now, believing it would hold you up. You didn’t question who made it, you didn’t ask for their credentials or if they had their PHD in chair making. You didnt even wonder if they had made some chairs that failed in the past, you just sat down believing it would hold you up.

Maybe instead of asking so many questions, maybe today you just need to sit in Christ and say “I may not have all the answers to my questions, but what I do know is this, I need someone to save me because I can’t save myself. I know I need a place to rest because my legs are tired from all of this anxiousness and worry. I just need to sit. When you do, loved one, He will carry you, He will empower you, He will save you. Just like the 3,000 who heard the gospel for the first time you too will be added to the number, just sit.

[1] Keller, Tim. Taken from a small group curriculum written in 1996-1997 called Evangelism: Studies in the Book Of Acts. This particular quote comes from page 4 of session 2.

Other videos in this series: