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November 22, 2020
Chris Bruno (South Campus) | Acts 2:14-21
But Peter, standing with the eleven, lifted up his voice and addressed them: “Men of Judea and all who dwell in Jerusalem, let this be known to you, and give ear to my words. For these people are not drunk, as you suppose, since it is only the third hour of the day. But this is what was uttered through the prophet Joel:
“‘And in the last days it shall be, God declares,
that I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh,
and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy,
and your young men shall see visions,
and your old men shall dream dreams;
even on my male servants and female servants
in those days I will pour out my Spirit, and they shall prophesy.
And I will show wonders in the heavens above
and signs on the earth below,
blood, and fire, and vapor of smoke;
the sun shall be turned to darkness
and the moon to blood,
before the day of the Lord comes, the great and magnificent day.
And it shall come to pass that everyone who calls upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.’”—Acts 2:14–21
Outline
Introduction
Introduction
As we come back to our text, let’s remember the setting: The apostle Peter is standing up with the Eleven, on the day of Pentecost. Notice that it is not just Peter standing, but Peter standing up with the eleven other apostles—kind of like when we had those Q&A sessions with all the elders up front, to remind us that it is not just Pastor Dave, but all the elders who are leading together. So the 12 apostles, the authorized representatives of the Lord Jesus, are standing up with the authority of Jesus to interpret what they had just witnessed: the outpouring of the Spirit.
In Luke 24:49, Jesus had told his followers to stay in Jerusalem until they were filled with power from on high. Here in Acts 2 that promise is fulfilled. The Spirit is poured out on each of them so that they can understand each other even though they are speaking many different languages in this reversal of the Tower of Babel, as Pastor Dave mentioned last week. And so in our text we are going to start explaining what happened last week.
As we walk through the first part of Peter’s sermon here in Acts 2, we are going to build a single sentence. A somewhat convoluted sentence, but one sentence that summarizes our text this morning. And in that sentence, we want to draw a line from the Old Testament to first-century Jerusalem that continues in our ongoing mission in the neighborhoods and nations.
The mission of Christ is planned and proclaimed in the Old Testament, fulfilled on the last day by the Spirit, who is poured out on all the people of God, as Jesus establishes his kingdom, so that the gospel is proclaimed as good news for all people.
This summary is not a literary masterpiece and nothing particularly new if you have been around the Bible for long. But as we unpack it, I think this summary will help us to both understand this text and to fill out for us how the Spirit empowers us for our unchanging mission. This should also help us see the significance of today’s text in light of our recent Global Focus Week and in our mission as a church here in Lakeville and beyond.
As Peter stands up to explain what is happening, he points us to the word of God.
We ought to interpret our experience through the Word of God. Go figure.
He is going to remind us that what we see happening in Acts 2 has always been a part of God’s plan of redemption and the ongoing work of Christ to fulfill his mission among the nations.
Some who were watching thought they were drunk. This might remind you of when the priest Eli suspected that Hannah was drunk when she was praying at the temple in 1 Samuel 1. But just like then, they were wrong: there was a much different Spirit at work as God kept his promises to his people, both in 1 Samuel and here in our text.
They are not drunk, Peter says. But let me tell you what is really going on: God is keeping his promises from Joel 2.
We’ll get into the content of Joel’s prophecy in a minute, but let me go ahead and plant this flag: the mission of Jesus that we will trace throughout Acts—and that we map our lives onto—has been planned and proclaimed in the Old Testament.
Just before Jesus told his followers to wait for the promise of his Father in Luke 24:49, he also told them that the Old Testament speaks of his death, his resurrection, and the proclamation of his name to the nations in vv. 46–48.
So in Luke’s overall narrative, there is a close link between the outpouring of the Spirit and the mission of the church to the nations. In Luke 24, Jesus says the mission itself is predicted in the Old Testament; here in our text, we can see that the outpouring of the Spirit, who empowers this mission, is also predicted in the Old Testament.
The mission of Christ to gather his people from among the nations is rooted in the plan of God from the beginning, proclaimed in the Old Testament prophets, and fulfilled in us, the church. That has not changed in 2020, and it will not change until the Lord returns.
Before we move forward, can I reiterate that this should fill us with a lot of confidence? Our mission as a church is not something that we invented. It is not our church’s mission or that of a particular denomination or group. This is the mission of Christ, who was sent by the Father and who has sent his Spirit. It is a mission that will not fail.
This mission of Christ is planned and proclaimed in the Old Testament and also fulfilled in the last day.
As we get into the content of the Old Testament prophecy, let’s consider the context of this prophecy in Joel 2. The Lord is speaking of the days when he will restore his people, end their exile, forgive their sin, and live among them again.
Joel 2:27 says, “You shall know that I am in the midst of Israel, and that I am the Lord your God and there is none else.”
When did the presence of the Lord return to his people? Or, to ask it another way, when did the Lord himself come to dwell among us? The Lord has come to dwell among us in the person of Jesus—who is God with us. And now he has poured out his Spirit, just as the book of Joel prophesied.
So we really are living in the last days—the days of “eschatological fulfillment,” to use a seminary professor word.
You might say, “Yes, I know we’re living in the last days because of the pandemic and the election and the riots this summer, etc.” Well, yes, those are all things that belong to the last days, but so did Nero’s persecution of the Christians and the barbarian conquest of Rome and the bubonic plague and the Reformation and the persecution of Christians around the world for the last two millennia.
The truth is, we have been living in the last days for 2,000 years. But that is not bad news, because the last days are the days of fulfillment, the days when the Spirit is poured out, the days when the Good News is extending from Jerusalem to Judea and Samaria and to the ends of the earth—even to Minnesota. And Hawaii. And the Pacific Islands, but more on that later.
The point I want us to see is that we are living in the days of God’s promises being fulfilled—when God is keeping his end times promises—first in the life, death, resurrection, ascension, and ongoing reign of Jesus, and then in the outpouring of his Spirit, which leads us to our next point.
So we continue: The mission of Christ is planned and proclaimed in the Old Testament, fulfilled on the last days by the Spirit, who is poured out on all the people of God.
The Lord promised to pour out his Spirit on all flesh. Now, I don’t think “all flesh” means every single person in the world. Instead, we can answer the question of who “all flesh” is by asking the question, “Who gets the Spirit?”
It is sons and daughters who prophesy, young men and old men who see visions and dream dreams, male and female servants who prophesy. In other words: It is not just a small, exclusive group, but the whole people of God who receive the gift of the Spirit.
Young and old, men and women, rich and poor. If you are united by faith to Jesus, then you have received the gift of the Spirit. This is what makes the new covenant so great: All the people of God get the gift of the Spirit so that all the people of God are equipped for the mission of Christ.
Moses hints at this outpouring of the Spirit in Numbers 11:29: “If only all the Lord’s people were prophets and the Lord would place his Spirit on them!” Throughout the Old Testament, only prophets, priests, and kings are given the Spirit. But now all the people of God are prophets, priests, and kings, because we are united by faith to the true Prophet, Priest, and King, the Lord Jesus. So if you are a part of his people, you too will receive and display the work of the Spirit as he empowers you to accomplish his mission.
The prophecy of Joel and its fulfillment here in Acts 2 is focused on miraculous events: the tongues of fire, the miraculous understanding, prophecies, dreams, and visions. But I think these things represent the broader work of the Spirit to empower the people of God for the mission.
The gifts listed here—prophecy, visions, and dreams—are important. But I don’t think they are the only or even more important evidence of the Spirit being poured out on God’s people. They represent the greater work of the Spirit throughout this age.
As we read through the rest of Acts and the New Testament, the work of the Spirit to empower his people for the mission of Christ includes gifts like healing and tongues, but the Spirit also empowers his people to endure suffering, love their enemies, and seek to take the gospel to the ends of the earth.
Even in this chapter, we’ll see what the Spirit does: He gives new life to 3,000 souls and causes them to be devoted to the teaching of the apostles, the fellowship of the saints, and the Lord’s Table. They sacrificed radically for each other and devoted their lives to the glory of God.
Here is the point: As the gospel spreads, we should expect miraculous things to happen. Like speaking in tongues and healing. And other miraculous things: Like loving the very people who hate us and try to kill us, giving away our possessions, forgiving each other, overcoming fear and even persecution to proclaim the gospel to those people who need it most.
Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control are the fruit of the Spirit for a reason. We can only experience them because of the miraculous outpouring of the Spirit that we see in Acts 2.
So don’t undersell the work of the Spirit among us. To walk in daily obedience to our king Jesus, to love each other and to come together as a church seeking to reach out neighbors and equip and support each other as we go to the nations is a miraculous work of the Spirit. Let’s lean into these things together.
Let’s be careful we don’t limit the work of the Spirit too narrowly—the point of the text is that in this age, the Lord is expanding the focus of the Spirit’s work and clarifying who gets to participate in this great mission of Christ: all of his people.
The Spirit is poured out on every person who is a part of God’s people. This means that every person who is a part of God’s people shares in the mission of Christ.
So then: This mission is planned and proclaimed in the Old Testament, fulfilled on the last day by the Spirit, who is poured out on all the people of God as Jesus establishes his kingdom.
You might be wondering how in the world I’m seeing the kingdom as the main point of vv. 19–20.
Well, whatever these signs are in vv. 19–20, I don’t think we can separate them from vv. 17–18 or v. 21. The Spirit is poured out, whoever calls on the Lord will be saved, and these wonders and signs appear—they all go together. So it would be unnatural to read these events as happening at a different time at the end of the age.
This language is similar to what we see in places like Isaiah 13:9–10.
Behold, the day of the LORD comes, cruel, with wrath and fierce anger, to make the land a desolation and to destroy its sinners from it. For the stars of the heavens and their constellations will not give their light; the sun will be dark at its rising, and the moon will not shed its light.
Isaiah 13:1 tells us that this is an oracle concerning the judgment of Babylon, when God would send the Medes and Persians to overthrow that empire (Isaiah 13:17). These signs, however they were fulfilled, were not the end of the world but instead represent the overthrow of one kingdom and the establishment of a new one.
John Calvin wrote that these “are figurative speeches, whereby he gives us to understand this much, that the Lord will show tokens of his wrath through the whole frame of the world, which will bring men even to their wit's end, as if there should be some horrible and fearful change of nature.” The kingdoms of this world are crumbling, and as they crumble, it should drive us to Christ.
This language is also very similar to what we see in Luke 24:44–45: “It was now about the sixth hour, and there was darkness over the whole land until the ninth hour, while the sun’s light failed. And the curtain of the temple was torn in two.” It seems like these events at the crucifixion are at least part of the fulfillment of Joel’s prophecy.
So if we put the pieces together, these cosmic signs are ...
This means that the signs in Joel are pointing to a new and greater kingdom that Jesus establishes through his death, resurrection, and ascension. He looked forward to the day when the Spirit would be poured out on all the people of God and a greater kingdom than any in this world would be established, with Jesus reigning as king.
So this also addresses the question that the disciples asked Jesus in Acts 1:7. “Will you restore the kingdom to Israel?” Well, the cosmic signs in Joel 2 look forward to the time when the kingdoms of this world become the kingdom of our Lord.
Peter will unpack this more in the rest of the sermon, so I won’t delve too deeply here, but the outpouring of the Spirit and the establishment of Jesus’ kingdom should transform the way we think about our mission.
This changes everything. The sun has been darkened and the cosmic order has been transformed because the prince of the power of the air has been cast from his throne and Jesus is reigning as king. He has all authority in heaven and on earth and under the earth. And we go out to the nations on the basis of the authority of our king Jesus, empowered by his Spirit, given to all of us. It is not based on our cleverness or our political power or our wealth—our mission has a much greater authority than any of those things—and it will outlast any of these things.
And that brings us to the last phrase in our long sentence, which also is also the main application of our text:
The mission of Christ is planned and proclaimed in the Old Testament, fulfilled on the last day by the Spirit, who is poured out on all the people of God, as Jesus establishes his kingdom, so that the gospel is proclaimed as good news for all people.
The culmination of Peter’s quote from Joel is that everyone who calls upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.
This last part is the purpose and result of everything that has come before. That is to say, the result of God keeping his covenant promises to pour out the Spirit and establish the kingdom is that everyone who calls upon the name of the Lord will be saved.
In Joel 2, to call on the name of the Lord means to cry out to YHWH, the creator and God of Israel, the ruler of all things for deliverance.
As Peter proclaims this text, the Lord is the king Jesus. We call upon and cry out to Jesus to be saved.
And this is the message that the Lord Jesus has entrusted to his church to take to the nations. Later on in Acts, we are going to meet the man who we now know as St. Paul—though he sure wasn’t a saint when we first meet him. But he would come to see King Jesus as his only hope, and he later quotes this same verse from Joel in Romans. As we think about the implications of this verse for us, consider what the Lord says through his servant Paul in Romans 10:9–13.
If you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved. For the Scripture says, “Everyone who believes in him will not be put to shame.” For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek; for the same Lord is Lord of all, bestowing his riches on all who call on him. For “everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”
So let me stop here for a moment and call you to cry out to Jesus. Kids, listen to me for a moment. Jesus is our only hope of salvation. He died and rose again to pay the price for our sin and win the victory over death. Are you trusting in him alone? Not in who your parents are, not that you come to church, not that your friends are Christians—but are you calling on the name of the Lord? This message is for everyone who is listening to me: kids and adults, men and women, people in the sanctuary, people in the commons, or people watching online: call upon the name of the Lord Jesus to be saved.
As we are empowered by the Spirit, we, the church, are sent to the ends of the earth with this message. We proclaim it in Lakeville, Burnsville, Apple Valley, Farmington, and all through Minnesota. Throughout North America, Europe, Africa, Asia, and the Pacific Islands, the message is the same: Call upon the name of the Lord to be saved.
This is why our family is going out as global partners: Because this message and this mission continue today by the power of the Spirit. As we press this message further to the ends of the earth, we want to help train pastors and church leaders who can take this good news even further than we can. We have a meeting after the service to talk about our ministry in the Islands, and I’d love you all to stay, to pray, and to give to that ministry.
But regardless of whether you are directly involved with our family’s ministry, we can’t lose sight of why we have been given the gift of the Spirit: for the mission that Christ has entrusted to his church.
All who call upon the name of the Lord will be saved. This is the message we hold fast to and the message we proclaim.
And that is exactly what we do as we come to the Table together. We come to this Table not because we have everything together, but we come to this Table because we recognize we need the Lord. And as we come, the Spirit who is poured out on us nourishes and strengthens our faith in the Lord Jesus.
And so we say, whoever calls on the Lord is welcome at this Table. And as we partake of the elements, we proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes, as 1 Corinthians 11 reminds us. And so we proclaim through coming to this Table, whoever calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.
The mission of Christ is planned and proclaimed in the Old Testament, fulfilled on the last day by the Spirit, who is poured out on all the people of God, as Jesus establishes his kingdom, so that the gospel is proclaimed as good news for all people. Pandemic or no, the work of the Spirit continues and the mission and message that the Lord Jesus has given to his church remains the same.
Like me, you may be weary. So let’s lean into the Spirit together and continue to press forward in the mission he has given to us, his church, by his power and for his glory.
Discussion Questions