Pentecost: The Fulfillment of a Promise
Minister: |
Rev. Ronald Van Overloop |
Date: |
6/12/2011 AM
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Text:
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Acts 2:16-22
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Psalters: |
252, 426, 393, 391 |
- What it signifies.
- Our text implies that what Joel did not experience (800 years earlier) they would in the last days,
- My Spirit is the Holy Spirit of God, Who is the means of revelation and of applying salvation.
- The Spirit would be poured out, i.e., to bestow abundantly, as a steady, gushing stream.
- God began pouring out the Spirit of Christ on Pentecost and has continued ever since.
- What are the differences between the time when this promise was given to Joel and the dispensation when it is fulfilled?
- Then this particular Spirit (that of Christ) was not yet for Christ was not yet (John 7:39).
- Then the Spirit worked through just a few: prophets, priests, and kings; not all the people were anointed.
- Then the Spirit operated only in one nation; it was not a universal Spirit.
- The recipients of the fulfillment of the promise are the living elect in heaven and on earth.
- Peter says the prophecy of Joel was fulfilled when the crowd heard and saw the result of the outpouring of Christ s Spirit.
- This was the appropriate time for God to fulfill the prophecy.
- The Messiah had accomplished salvation.
- On Pentecost nothing new was created, but the old was enriched.
- It shall come to pass in the last days.
- Joel saw that last day as one with no long period between the first and second coming of Jesus.
- We know the whole New Dispensation is the last day (after which there will be no other days).
- The effect of the pouring out of the Spirit of Christ is that it prepares the nations for judgment.
- The immediate effect is that all the members of the church are given to understand divine revelation.
- How do they all prophesy? Through the apostles and the Scriptures, we know the promise and speak of it.
- After Pentecost every member can receive and understand God s revelation as it comes through the preaching.
- And if we possess the Spirit, we will speak ( prophesy ). We will make our confession in the world.