How much we owe God’s Spirit! Our life, gifts, unity, peace, guidance, instruction, comfort…
Through the prophet Joel, God promised His people that some day, “I will pour out My Spirit on all flesh” (Joel 2:28). And on the day of Pentecost in Acts 2, that’s exactly what happened! In fact, as Peter preached to the crowd that day, he said, “This is what was spoken by the prophet Joel” and then quoted Joel 2:28-32. Do you see the festivals laying out God’s crucial days in history? First, the death of Christ, pictured in the Passover; then His resurrection, seen in the feast of Firstfruits. Following that, the Lord told His disciples “not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the Promise of the Father, ‘which,’ He said, ‘you have heard from Me; for John truly baptized with water, but you shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now’” (Acts 1:4-5). The proof that Christ had been throned in glory was that the Holy Spirit came, because while Jesus was still on earth “the Holy Spirit was not yet given, because Jesus was not yet glorified” (Jn 7:39). Peter understood this and continued, “Therefore being exalted to the right hand of God, and having received from the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, He poured out this which you now see and hear” (Acts 2:33). But while there was inactive leaven in the offering, remember this “new grain offering” (Lev 23:16) was mostly “fine flour” (v 17), which we saw earlier speaks of the perfections of Christ, especially as God’s bread to satisfy His people. That’s why we meet to enjoy Christ on the Lord’s Day, the first day of the week, instead of the Sabbath, the seventh day, since both Christ’s resurrection and the birthday of the Church were on the day of the new beginning. In Christ, “old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new” (2 Cor 5:17).