"The Indwelling Holy Spirit" (Acts 10:34-48)

Transcript:

What a blessing. Zion's children, let us hear together and open together God's word. Our study today will be from Acts chapter 10. We'll be looking at verses 34 through 48. If you're using a Pew Bible this morning, this will be on page 1,092.

1092 Again, Acts chapter 10, verses 34 through 48. Here, the word of the Lord from Acts 10:34, 48. So Peter opened his mouth and said, truly, I understand that God shows no partiality, but in every nation, anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him. As for the word that he sent to Israel, preaching good news of peace through Jesus Christ, he is Lord of all. You yourselves know what happened throughout all Judea, beginning from Galilee after the baptism that John performed.

How God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power. He went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with him. And we are witnesses of all that he did, both in the country of the Jews and in Jerusalem. They put him to death by hanging him on a tree. But God raised him on the third day and made him to appear not to all the people, but to us who had been chosen by God as witnesses, who ate and drank with him after he rose from the dead.

And he commanded us to preach to the people and to testify that he is the one appointed by God to be judge of the living and the dead. To Him. All the prophets bear witness that everyone who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins through his name. While Peter was still saying these things, the Holy Spirit fell on all who heard the Word. And the believers from among the circumcised who had come with Peter were amazed because the gift of the Holy Spirit was poured out even on the Gentiles, for they were hearing them speaking in tongues and extolling God.

Then Peter declared, can anyone withhold water for baptizing these people who have received the Holy Spirit just as we have? And he commanded them to be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ. Then they asked him to remain for some days. This is the word of the Lord. Thanks be to God.

Please be seated, and as you're taking your seats, let's pray for God's help as we consider this great text together this morning. Gracious Heavenly Father, we pray we still need the Spirit. We still need your Spirit to indwell us to speak with your voice through the words that He Himself inspired of the prophets and apostles of old that have been set down in the scriptures of The Old and New Testaments, we still need that same spirit to illuminate these words. And we pray that your spirit would fill your people, that you would draw those who do not yet believe in Jesus Christ, who is Lord of all, to call them to repentance and faith. And we pray also that by your Spirit you would give us hearts to understand, eyes to see and ears to hear all that is contained in the good news, that of the Gospel, of your son, our Savior, Jesus Christ.

It is in Christ's name that we pray. Amen.

Well, back at the beginning of this sermon series, in Acts, chapter one, verse eight, we studied how Jesus commissioned his apostles to be witnesses. His witnesses through the power of the Holy Spirit, not only in Jerusalem, but even extending into the wider region of Judea and beyond that into Samaria and even to the end of the earth. Well, in today's passage, as we have seen the slow and steady progress of the Gospel, in many ways this is a small step forward for man. But this is a giant leap for mankind as the Holy Spirit extends even to the Gentiles, to the ends of the earth. Because of this passage, the Gentiles, and that includes us today, possess the Holy Spirit, have the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit.

Now, theologically, biblically, that's what's happening here. But I want us to think, practically speaking, what exactly does this mean? What does it mean to possess the Holy Spirit as we read about the Holy Spirit extending into the Gentiles and beyond here to all the nations of the earth? To answer that, I think it helps to put yourself in the position of someone living in the Old Testament before the coming of Christ, before the sending of the Holy Spirit. Let's think of specifically, if you were an Old Testament Israelite, you would have lived, even though you were among the called and the chosen race of God, you would have lived most of your life at a distance from God that most of us having, growing up in the church, have a hard time getting our minds around.

You didn't live in the temple. Most likely, you lived quite far from the temple. You would go to the temple, to the festivals where you would hear God's word preached, read and sung, and you would see the sacrifices offered. But that would be three times per year. And if you were a woman, you probably would not be making this trip.

All males were called to go. And even if you were there, when you were coming to the temple, bringing your sacrifice to the temple, you were not permitted to enter the temple. There was a courtyard that you were Allowed to come in with your animal, with your sacrificial animal. You would lay your head, your hands to transfer your sins to this animal. But it was the priests who would slaughter the animal.

It's the priest who would go beyond you, taking the blood of that animal and the body of that animal, putting it on the sacrificial altar and carrying that blood into the holy places to minister and to pray in your behalf in God's presence, where you could not go, you were kept at arm's length from God. More than that. For the rest of the year, you would go six days a week, working very hard in the fields, and you had no Bible to read. Most of it had not been written, but you probably didn't own one. The priests and the Levites who were living in your area may have had a Bible on the Sabbath days, week by week.

They may have taught you the Scriptures, or maybe not. Your only access to God was few and far between. And this, of course, was much worse for the Gentiles of the world. As Paul says, you were far off, strangers from the covenants of promise, without God and without hope in the world.

And yet here we see God not only drawing near to the Jews, but drawing near to Gentiles. And not simply drawing near to them, but drawing so intimately near them as to indwell themselves spiritually. So what do we have from this? What difference does this make practically in our life today, on Tuesday, on Friday? Well, the difference that we have that we cannot say enough about, is that by the indwelling presence of God, we have been given direct and immediate access to God himself.

Not arm's length, not far off, not mediated by mere humans who can go where we cannot. But we have direct and immediate access to God. And so our theme this morning is this. Through the Holy Spirit, enjoy your immediate relationship to God. Two parts to this sermon text this morning.

First, that the Holy Spirit anointed Jesus. The Holy Spirit anointed Jesus. Second, the Holy Spirit indwells you well. As we consider this first section, that the Holy Spirit anointed Jesus, which is what Peter proclaims in his preaching of the Gospel in verses 34 through 43, it's helpful to remember what happened previously. Again, in verses 1 through 33 of this chapter, Peter had seen a great vision where he saw a sheet descended from heaven that was filled with clean and unclean animals.

And he was told to rise and kill and eat these clean and unclean animals. It was very perplexing, very confusing to Peter, but when it all happened, three times. And when the vision was taken up from in front of him, he was left wondering what he was supposed to do. The Holy Spirit says, rise and go with the ones who are calling you. Without hesitation, the ones who had come to the house where he was staying were sent by a Gentile.

They themselves were Gentiles. And without hesitation, Peter went up to go to the house of a Gentile, the house of Cornelius and Caesarea. And here he is, as Cornelius has gathered his whole household and his friends to hear whatever Peter had come to proclaim to them. And Peter opens his mouth and declares these good words. Now, we studied last week, as we considered our communion text from verses 34 and 35, that God shows no partiality.

God is a God who elects, who chooses, who distinguishes, who chooses some and not others. But he does not do that because of anything that is worthy in us of being chosen, of being called, rather is purely because of him, purely because of his free mercy and grace toward wildly wickedly undeserving sinners like you and me. And so we come on the basis of faith. And in verse 36, Peter picks up this theme. He says, as for the Word that he sent to Israel, because again in the previous section, he's saying it wasn't just Israel, it wasn't just those who were elected by God.

In the Old Testament, if in every nation, anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him. So in verse 36, as for the word that he sent to Israel, because indeed, this did come first to Israel, preaching good news of peace through Jesus Christ. Now, this message came first to Israel through Jesus Christ, but it is not limited to Israel, as Peter again affirms at the end of verse 36, he says, he, or more literally, this one, is Lord of all, not just of Israel. Jesus is not the private Lord of the Jewish people. He's Lord of all, Lord of all nations.

Now, apparently they had some knowledge already of Jesus Christ, because in verse 37, Peter says, you yourselves know what happened throughout all Judea, beginning from Galilee after the baptism that John proclaimed. So they must have known about John the Baptist and the repentance that John the Baptist had proclaimed. And what happened in Jesus. Verse 38, How God anointed Jesus of Nazareth. Now, this is an extremely important phrase here.

This idea of anointing is very important when we consider the identity of Jesus as the Christ. Because when we say that Jesus is the Christ, that Greek word, Christos Christ is, is a word that simply means the anointed one in Hebrew the word is Mashiach or Messiah, Messiah, Christ. Both of them mean anointed one. And so for Peter to proclaim that God anointed Jesus of Nazareth, what he is essentially saying is God made Jesus of Nazareth the Messiah. He made him the Christ.

Now, Jesus was not the first anointed one. He was not the first Messiah. He was not the first Christ. Although we would call those little m Messiahs, little c Messiahs. In the Old Testament, there were three offices that to enter into that office, you had to be anointed with oil.

If you were a prophet, if you were a priest, if you were a king, you had to be anointed with oil in order to enter into those positions, enter into those offices. And very often when we read these figures being anointed with oil, we read about the Holy Spirit rushing on those figures who enter into that office. From that point forward, anointing was directly connected with the ministry of the Holy Spirit. Well, there was no oil anointing for Jesus. But we read that Jesus had the substance of what oil anointing pointed for.

We read, God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power. So again, as FF Bruce writes, this means that God made Jesus of Nazareth Messiah and he's anointed with the Holy Spirit, with the same Holy Spirit who indwells us. And that connection is important. We're going to come back to that in a moment. But look at what Jesus did with this authority, by the Holy Spirit and with the power of the Holy Spirit.

We read he went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil. For God was with him.

Jesus was more than a good teacher. He exerted his authority and his power over even the demons. Now this is important because the nations worshiped. The Gentiles worshiped their pagan gods, their idols. And as Paul writes in first Corinthians that behind every idol is a demon.

To worship the idols is to worship demons. They sought power from these demonic forces they called their gods. And yet Jesus during his lifetime had power and authority over these unclean spirits. He is Lord of lords. He is the God of gods.

This one is Lord of all, all the nations, all the gods of the nations. Well, in verse 39, Peter focuses in on what he was commissioned as an apostle to bear witness for, to testify about verse 39. And we are witnesses of all that he did, both in the country of the Jews, that's Judea. And in Jerusalem, they. The Jews put him to death by hanging him on a tree.

He's Talking about the crucifixion, where Jesus was nailed to a cross that is called a tree. And as he was hanged on a tree, he was put to death. But God, reversing this action, reversed on appeal, he was condemned unrighteously, and on appeal he was reversed. And God raised him on the third day and made him to appear not to all the people, but to us who had been chosen by God as witnesses. Now, it's very interesting.

This is the basic Gospel message that we see proclaimed and preached throughout the entire book of Acts. From the very first messages. This is what Peter was preaching on the day of Pentecost to the Jews gathered for that festival. This will continue to be the message that's preached by not only Peter, but then also Paul and others throughout the course of the rest of the Book of Acts. But it's so interesting that in each place where this is preached, there's a different emphasis, there's a different point that's brought home that's tailored to the exact audience.

And here, one of the big issues that Gentiles had a problem with is with the concept, the notion of the resurrection from the dead. We will see this especially considered when Paul preaches at Areopagus in Athens. There they are following him, wanting to hear this new teaching until the point where he bears witness to the resurrection of the dead, and they begin to laugh at him and scoff him. And so these Gentiles here hearing this message that Jesus was raised from the dead, notice the proofs that he offers at the end of verse 41, who ate and drank with him after he rose from the dead. One of the commentators point out that if you look back at Luke in Luke 24, 42, 43, after Jesus appeared to his disciples and offered here touch my scarred hands and feet and sighed, some of them still doubted.

And the proof that Jesus gave to prove that he was a true, bodily resurrected man was that he ate and drank to put away their doubts. So eating and drinking is proof that he was indeed raised from the dead. And perhaps to help these Gentiles to understand the reality of the resurrection, Peter brings up that detail here. Now, to these Gentiles, if you notice, there isn't much quoting of Scripture in the speeches to the Jews. Those have been filled with quotations and references back to the scriptures of the Old Testament.

And yet Peter does not want to give the impression that this Jesus is some new God that is sweeping away the God of the Old Testament. And so in verse 43, he declares to him to Jesus all the prophets, that is the Old Testament, bear witness that everyone who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins through his name. What was preached, what was proclaimed, that all those throughout the entire Old Testament was proclaiming that all those who believe in Jesus will be saved from his by his name. Now, this is an extraordinary proclamation of the Gospel. And what I want to make be at pains to demonstrate is that there is a direct continuity between what is preached in this passage 2,000 years ago to the household and friends and family of Cornelius.

There's direct continuity between this sermon to what we are doing here and what we are preaching and proclaiming here today. We continue to preach the same message of Jesus Christ, that this one who is Lord of all, was the eternally begotten Son of God, who took upon himself a human nature, who was born as a true man, an Israelite, the offspring of Abraham, the true heir to the throne of David. And this one preached peace. And by John, he was baptized not only with water, but by the power of the Holy Spirit. And by that power of the Holy Spirit, he exercised authority even over demonic power.

He was crucified on a cruel tree. He suffered, bled and died as a substitute sacrifice for the sins of his people. But on the third day, he rose bodily from the dead. He let them touch the scars in his hands and his side and his feet, and he ate and drank with them. Now we preach that this same Jesus Christ remains the Lord of all.

He has not been dethroned. He has not lost the power of the once for all sacrifice that he gave by his own life. And he has not lost anything of the power of indestructible life in which he was raised from the dead. The same Jesus Christ has been appointed as the judge of the living and the dead. And that day is 2,000 years closer than it was when Peter preached to Cornelius.

But the good news of the Gospel, as all the prophets bear witness from Old Testament to New Testament, is that everyone who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins through his name. Have you believed in the name of Jesus? Do you know that he died for you? Is your hope, your certainty, your confidence in the resurrection of the dead by which God raised him from the dead, and which he will also raise all those who are looking to him in faith from the dead on the last day? Do you understand that this one, who is coming as the judge of the living and the dead has become your advocate?

He lays aside his claims as judge and he instead takes up the role as your defense attorney? Do you know this? This Extraordinary gospel of Jesus Christ is still preached among the nations, not only here, but around the world. And so this is the first and most urgent question. Do you believe in Jesus?

But the second issue arises in this text. What do we do with the Holy Spirit whom Jesus sends into this world on his behalf while his body remains in heaven? This comes to our second section, verses 44 through 48, about the Holy Spirit indwelling you. The Holy Spirit indwells you. It is a wonderful thing for God himself to interrupt one's sermon.

Be happy for that at any time. This is what happens to Peter. Verse 44. While Peter was still saying these things, he's still preaching. This is a typical preacher just continuing on.

And the Holy Spirit fell at that moment, while he was still saying these things, fell on all who heard the Word. Notice the connection. The Holy Spirit is intimately connected to the Word of God. The same God who inspired the words of Scripture is the same God, the Holy Spirit, who brings these words to life for his people. And here the Holy Spirit fell on all who heard the Word.

And so we read that there are these visible signs to confirm and to ratify and to seal the fact that the Holy Spirit had indeed now indwelled Gentiles. Not merely Jews, not merely Samaritans, but the Gentiles. And the believers from among the circumcised who had come with Peter were amazed because the gift of the Holy Spirit was poured out even on the Gentiles. For they were hearing them speaking in tongues and extolling God. Now, on the basis of this, Peter recognizes these two have entered the family of God.

These two are fellow believers. These two are brothers and sisters. These two are on equal plane with.

And so he says, can anyone withhold water for baptizing these people who have received the Holy Spirit just as we have? And he commanded them to be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ. Then they asked him to remain for some days and Peter remained, discipling them and helping them to grow in their initial faith. Now two weeks ago, we studied the barriers that were standing between the Jews and the Gentiles. Now particularly, it's important to understand that these barriers were not just some kind of racism or prejudice.

These were God appointed barriers to divide Jews from Gentiles. We studied the fact that the food laws had been given precisely that purpose. God had separated the Jews from the Gentiles by the food laws. As we studied the passage regarding the food laws and looked at Leviticus 20, verse 26, for the reason that God had given those food laws the Lord Himself declared, you shall be holy to me, for I the Lord am holy and have separated you from the peoples the Gentiles, that you should be mine. And yet in the previous passage, God had a abolished those food laws.

When Peter was told to rise and kill and eat, God himself said, what God has cleansed, what God has made clean, do not call uncommon. These things are no longer common and unclean. But also God had separated the Jews from the Gentiles from association, from interaction to protect the holiness of the tabernacle and the temple. Leviticus 15:31 Thus you shall keep the people of Israel separate from their the Gentiles uncleanness lest they the Jews die in their uncleanness by defiling my tabernacle that is in their midst. And yet God Himself commanded Peter to go with Cornelius the Gentile without hesitation.

That's a huge step to enter the house of Cornelius. That's a huge step forward. But third, God himself had formerly excluded the Gentiles from his temple as unclean. Ezekiel 44, verse 9 thus says the Lord God, no foreigner, uncircumcised in heart and flesh, of all the foreigners who are among the people of Israel shall enter my sanctuary.

And yet what we see here is that the Holy Spirit, whose indwelling presence had been what made the temple holy. And this is the whole reason Gentiles had to be excluded from the temple. Because the Holy Spirit was there. That same Holy Spirit had not simply invited the Gentiles to now come to the Temple. That same Holy Spirit had indwelt Gentiles themselves, thus making what was formerly unclean to be clean.

Gentiles are no longer kept away from God. God indwells all the peoples of the earth through faith in Jesus Christ. And because of this, the Gospel is now preached to the ends of the earth. I'm pursuing a degree at Puritan Reformed Theological Seminary and one of the fun things that I get to do with fellow students is a twice a semester global prayer meeting. Just this Monday I was in prayer on a video conference with some who were in these countries, some who had just gotten back from these countries from Brazil and Congo and Taiwan.

Formerly we've had someone in China teaching in seminary there in England, Argentina, Germany and South Africa. Now this is an exciting call to think about world missions, but it's also so deeply practical for ordinary believers like you and me today here in Lansing on a Sunday morning. Our application from this is just what we said the theme was through the Holy Spirit. Enjoy your immediate relationship with God. What we are seeing here is what has rightly been called the Pentecost of the Gentile world.

There is direct, immediate access to God, the Holy Spirit. For Jews and Gentiles together, there is no more division between one another between Jews and Gentiles, for Jesus Christ himself has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility, as Paul writes in Ephesians 2, verse 14. But what is most emphasized here is that there is no more division between the Gentiles of the earth and the immediate, direct, indwelling presence of God, the Holy Spirit. Now, as I started this sermon, I want you to understand Old Testament religion was heavily mediated. Someone went between you and God.

These were anointed mediators, the prophets and the priests and the kings. But all of these in the Old Testament were merely human mediators, and yet they had access to God that you did not. The prophets were mere humans, but they mediated God's word to you. There is no word of God without the prophets. The kings were mere humans, but they mediated God's reign and his rule.

There was no leadership without the kings. The priests were mere humans who mediated God's presence. So there was no access to God without what the priests were doing in the holy places behind the curtains. These anointed mediators had access to God that you did not. They directly knew God in a way that you did not.

But the promise of the New Covenant, as all the prophets had had declared, the promise of the New Covenant is, as it's poignantly put in Jeremiah 31, verse 34, is that in the New Covenant they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest. They will no longer be mediators who know God, who have access to God in a way that you do not. Now, there are two practical parts of this, and these are going to sound so simple, but I want to see if this text gives us new meaning. To understand what's happening here, two practical application points are, first of all, that you can pray to God and you can hear God's voice in the Bible in a way that was not possible in the Old Testament. Now, these are actually.

These two points are some of the largest differences that stand between Biblical Christianity and Roman Catholicism. Rome says that you still need merely human mediators, that you do not have direct access to God, they say, and they will qualify this, and I want to be fair, but they say that you should not largely go directly to God in prayer through the God man mediator, Jesus Christ, but rather it's better to ask the glorified saints to pray for you, or to appeal to the Virgin Mary and ask her to pray for you, or to ask your priests here on earth to pray for you because they have access to God that you do not. Now, there's no biblical warrant to ask the dead to pray for us. Also, I do not wish to say that you can't ask others to pray. I would love to pray for you.

But you have the divine privilege of going directly into the presence of God by the Holy Spirit who indwells you. He's actually teaching you to pray, groaning in you to lead you to more accurately direct your prayers through Jesus Christ, the one mediator between God and men, who stands in heaven interceding for you.

Rome also teaches that you cannot read the Bible directly, that you need the mediation of the Church to interpret it. Now, this never means when we deny that, that you should ignore what the Holy Spirit has taught our forefathers in the faith. The Nicene Creed that we confessed together earlier is important because the Holy Spirit was already teaching other believers like you and me what the Scriptures teach. And we continue to confess those things together to have guardrails to our faith because we don't want to be want to imagine that the Holy Spirit speaks only to me. But he does speak directly to me and to you by His Spirit.

As we read the Bible, we can hear God's voice in a way that they could not in the Old Testament. The Scriptures teach that the same Holy Spirit who anointed Jesus is the same Holy Spirit who indwells you. The same Holy Spirit who filled up the temple is the same Holy Spirit who fills up.

Now, our creeds and confessions are important, but you can hear God speaking to you. You do not need a human mediator. You have direct, immediate access to God's spirit. So pray. Come with confidence to enter the holy places of God's temple in heaven by the blood of Jesus, by the new and living way that has been opened to the tearing of his curtain, which is his flesh.

God's own Holy Spirit is groaning within you, teaching you to pray as you want. So pray More than that. Read your Bible. Yes. Use creeds and confessions to stay within the guardrails of orthodoxy.

Yes. Ask your pastor or another believer to help. For help interpreting tricky passages. But God, I want you to understand. God speaks to you in the Bible.

You do not have immediate access to his voice except when you hear God's word by His Spirit speaking to you through the pages and the text of Scripture. Read your Bible and practically speaking, it is not too late to join a Bible reading plan for this year. It's not too late to join the McShane Bible reading plan that many of us are reading through right here today. There are reading plans available. You can grab one, you can start reading immediately.

All of the readings every day are recorded by podcast. There is no excuse in this day and age not to read the Bible every day. I put together a resource called Free Daily Bible Study that will help you to understand and connect with the larger scripture. What's going on and if you follow us on Facebook, Everyday's readings and meditation is now posted to our Facebook page. But you don't need me.

You don't need to wait for a prophet. You don't need a priest.

God speaks to you today. If you are willing to open your Bible and hear his voice speaking, take up your Bibles and read. Get on your knees and pray. Enjoy the immediate direct access that you have to God Almighty by his Holy Spirit. Let's pray.

Heavenly Father, we are mindful that this is not a rote ritual thing to do to hear your word and to pray to you by your son, Jesus Christ, the one mediator between God and men, the man, Christ Jesus. You have opened the way and by your spirit you have intimately connected us to the fullness of the Deity as he is the down payment, the deposit of you all, the fullness of God. And so we pray this morning that your spirit would help us to hear your word in this text that we've studied to hear the Gospel of Jesus, to once again repent from our sins and believe on Christ for salvation. And that, Father, we would be reconciled to to you through Christ and by your spirit. We pray all this in the name of your son, our Savior, Jesus Christ.

Amen.