A Burning Dove

Royal Priesthood, Holy Nation                                          Acts 2:3

A Burning Dove

by Robert T. Cooper

So there was this wind sound that filled the whole house. Now, there were 120 adult men there, not counting the women and under 13’s. So don’t go thinking house. Not even the wealthiest residents of Jerusalem had a personal abode like that. Think meeting hall. But the point of the sound filling the entire structure is to indicate that no person present failed to hear the sound.

So when we get to verse 3, we find that all saw this phenomenon. It seemed to be flickers of flame like one would see burning on the wick of a candle. So we have this additional metaphor going: a sound and a flame.

So everyone hears the sound and everyone sees the flickers which divide in such a way that there is a separate flicker that comes to rest on each one present. The traditional way of visualizing this is to imagine flames like each person was a candle with a wick coming out of the top of each person’s head.

Interestingly, we are not told how long this phenomenon lasted. Surely the image was gone by the time anyone outside the room heard what happened next. (We’ll get to that another time.)

Now, compare this with the descent of the Holy Spirit on Jesus at the Savior’s baptism. In that case, the Spirit descended in a form that gave one an impression of something similar to a dove. The text does not say that an actual bird flew down and sat on Jesus. It says that the Spirit descended like a dove.

If this is the exact same Holy Spirit, why was the image like a dove in one case and like tongues of fire in the other case? One possible answer is that the Holy Spirit was marking Jesus to be Isaiah’s prophecies Prince of Peace, while He was marking the 120+ as being on fire for God.

Remember that Jesus said the Apostles (and others present at that time) would have power when the Holy Spirit came on them. So when the Holy Spirit came to rest on each one, it was in order to fuel the witness of each believer as the Gospel began to be carried to the uttermost part of the world.

Today the Holy Spirit comes to indwell each person who places his or her faith in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. He is the source of our peace that passes understanding. He is the source of our power to witness to our community and beyond. He is like a burning dove. Let’s make sure we don’t quench the Spirit.

What are some other metaphors for the Holy Spirit? Also, please share with us some times the Holy Spirit gave you peace or empowered your witness.

A Sound Like the Blowing of a Violent Wind

Royal Priesthood, Holy Nation                                    Acts 2:1 – 4

A Sound Like the Blowing of a Violent Wind

by Robert T. Cooper

I am not particularly a fan of what I call “nasty 20^th and 21^st century music.” One of the strains of that genre has been music enhanced by recorded electronic effects. The first time I heard a church anthem with such effects was when I was in seminary. It was an anthem based on Acts 2:1 – 4. The recorded electronic effects were for the portion of anthem in which there was “a sound like the blowing of a violent wind.” At least I understood what was happening in that music.

It is not uncommon for preachers to emphasize that the word is one and the same for spirit, for breath, and for wind. Therefore, if we want to understand some things about the Holy Spirit, it would be good for us to think some about the characteristics of wind.

For one thing, wind is simply the moving of bodies of air. It can be gentle. It can be blustery. It can be steady. It can be destructive. It can be forceful. These can all be metaphors for the way God’s Holy Spirit moves within our own lives.

For another thing, wind doesn’t really make any sound of its own. What makes the sound is the vibrations the moving air sets up as it passes by various objects, including our own ears. Similarly, the Holy Spirit doesn’t really call attention to Himself. Rather, He causes resonance within people and events as He moves upon them.

For us, the most violent winds usually take the force of tornados, hurricanes, and hurricane-force winds. Some people say tornados sound like a train. The coming of the Holy Spirit on Pentecost made “a sound like the blowing of a violent wind.” Therefore, we have to believe that the significance of Pentecost was the forcefulness of what God was doing.

"Wind of the Spirit" by Jennifer Jones

www.gloryglimpses.com/2011/08/pentecost-wind-of-spirit.html

We usually think of violent winds as being destructive. What could the Holy Spirit have been doing when He came upon the 120 (that just counted the grown men, so we can be certain there were more) praying believers in the upper room? What could the Spirit have been doing that was so destructive? Perhaps we will have to wait until all things are revealed to understand it fully. However, I believe it may have had to do with the passing of the era when the Holy Spirit merely came upon certain individuals for a time; that era was replaced with a new era in which the Holy Spirit would come to indwell everyone who places his or her faith in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior.

We still have to stop and listen to the Holy Spirit. How have you heard the Spirit in recent days? I look forward to your comments.

Just Sort of Slips Them in There

Royal Priesthood, Holy Nation                                        Acts 1:14

Just Sort of Slips Them in There

by Robert T. Cooper

 

I had been a member of this Glee Club in college. Now I was a graduate, attending one of their concerts in Dallas. There was a fellow still in that choir who had been in the choir at the same time I was. When the concert ended, this fellow made a beeline for me. He wanted to let me know that he had in the intervening time placed his faith in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. My friend is still walking with Christ today. Sometimes we “accidentally” discover that someone has become a fellow believer in Christ.

 

Acts 1:14 mentions some people who were in this 24/7 prayer meeting during the days between the Ascension and Pentecost. We aren’t surprised to find the Apostles there. We aren’t surprised to find Mary, the mother of Jesus, there. It isn’t even particularly surprising to find “the women” there. (This was a substantial group of women who traveled around with Jesus and His disciples during the 3½ year ministry of Jesus. They frequently were the source for funding for the ministry.)

 

But we are surprised to discover that Jesus’ four brothers were part of the prayer meeting. The last we had heard of these brothers, they had been taunting Jesus about how He behaved as a public figure, taunting because they were not believers in Jesus or in His mission. In fact, at the crucifixion, Jesus gave a verbal will as He hung on the cross. He gave the care of His mother to John, the youngest of the Apostles, rather than to any of His brothers. Yet here, not two months later, the four brothers are with the Apostles at the prayer meeting.

 

What had happened? How had they turned from mockers into disciples? Frankly, the Bible does not tell us. It is a mystery, and will remain so until we see them and can ask them for ourselves. Yet they were converted. And when Luke mentions they were participants in the prayer meeting, he doesn’t make a big deal of it. He just sort of slips them in there. Moreover, two of those brothers ended up writing books of the New Testament. One of those brothers ended up being the Senior Pastor of the Church at Jerusalem, pastor of the Twelve Apostles.

 

It is not an uncommon thing. The person it never occurred to you would eventually come to faith in Christ does become a believer. In fact, God seems to enjoy bringing salvation to unlikely candidates. So don’t give up on people. Perhaps all won’t be converted, but you never know. Only God knows.

 

In the Comments section, we’d love to hear any stories you may have of someone who came to faith in Christ, someone He just sort of slipped in there.

This Same Jesus

Royal Priesthood, Holy Nation                                        Acts 1:11

This Same Jesus

by Robert T. Cooper

The Jesus Who ascended from the ridge of the Mount of Olives some 40 days after His Resurrection is the exact same Jesus Who will return to Earth to the very same ridge of the Mount of Olives.

There have been several attempts throughout history to characterize the Jesus of the Day of the Lord as a “different” Jesus. There have been the attempts of cults to create a Jesus with a different backstory and a different future. There have been the attempts of non-Christian religions to create a Jesus who is not a Person of the Trinity, the Second Person, God the Son, in particular. Sometimes this Jesus is a mere prophet. Sometimes He is an angel. Sometimes He is simply the Christ Spirit.

But the Jesus Who ascended is the exact same Jesus known personally today by those who have placed their faith in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. The Jesus who is known personally today by Christian disciples is the exact same Jesus Who is coming again.

Those who have not yet placed their faith in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior cannot fully comprehend the certainty of Christian disciples. However, they are invited to repent and believe. Then they will commence a relationship with Jesus, Who is and Who is to come.

If you have placed your faith in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, briefly comment about your relationship with your personal Redeemer.

Or

If you have not yet placed your faith in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, you are invited to do so at this time. When you do, record it in the comments section so we may rejoice with you.

Ordinary Days, Extraordinary Days

Royal Priesthood, Holy Nation                                      Acts 1:6 – 11

Ordinary Days, Extraordinary Days

by Robert T. Cooper

That morning I got up and got dressed as usual. It was a Sunday, but it was an ordinary Sunday. The family went to church. I went to my Bible Study group. What I had not counted on was being gripped by the idea of what it means to be a Christian, a person who has placed his faith in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. When we went home, we had lunch. It was a Sunday dinner, but it was an ordinary Sunday dinner. But after dinner, I asked my mother about this idea of what it means to be a Christian. I figured she would be able to answer my questions. And did she ever! But more than that, in the course of the conversation with her open Bible on the dining room table, the Holy Spirit spoke to my heart as well. That day I placed my faith in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. It was an ordinary day, but it was an extraordinary day as well!

The Sunday the Jesus met His disciples at the summit of the Mount of Olives, it was a rather ordinary day. They had met there many times. Of course, this was the resurrected Jesus. It had been 40 days since Jesus rose from the dead. But He had met with the disciples enough times now that this was in one sense an ordinary meeting with them, or at least so they thought.

Suddenly, their ordinary teaching, questioning, conversing interaction with Jesus was interrupted. Something extraordinary happened. Jesus was answering a question and telling them about what would happen when the Holy Spirit came upon them. Suddenly, He “was taken up before their very eyes, and a cloud hid” Him so that they could not see Him anymore. The ordinary turned extraordinary.

Isn’t that how God works a lot of the time? We are going about our ordinary, daily lives as though time will continue forever. Then, bang! God does the totally unexpected. Or it may be that we were expecting something, but we never realized it would be quite the way God finally brought it to pass. Extraordinary!

Enoch had been walking with God for a long time. He walked with God every day. He went out to walk with God on a particular day. It was an ordinary “walk with God” kind of a day. But that day, Enoch did not come home to his earthly home because God had translated him, taking him on to his heavenly home without going through death. So far as we know, besides the ascension of Jesus, Enoch and Elijah were the only ones to go straight to heaven without dying. It was an extraordinary day!

Noah and his family had been building on that boat for decades. They moved into it. But for the folks around him, it was just an ordinary day. Work, eat, sleep. Births, deaths, weddings, funerals. Ordinary days. Only on this one day, God does something extraordinary.

And at the end of time (could it be just any day now?) it will be like it was in the days of Noah. Work, eat, sleep. Births, deaths, weddings, funerals. Two will be working in the field; one will be taken and the other left. Two will be in the bed; one will be taken and the other left. An ordinary day, but an extraordinary day.

But before then, God may do something else extraordinary in you, around you, through you, or with you. There is just no way of telling. We just live our ordinary lives. We live them for Him. We walk with Him today, and then we walk with Him again tomorrow. And just when you least expect it, bang! God just may do the extraordinary! He really might, you know?

Question: Have you ever had an extraordinary day because God did something totally out of the ordinary? If you don’t mind, please tell us about it. Be sure to give God the glory.