NT Framework - Four Pentecosts

The four Pentecosts in Acts show how tongues marks key moments when new people groups are brought into the one church.

More information about Beyond the Walls, including additional resources can be found at www.beyondthewalls-ministry.com 

This series included graphics to illustrate what is being taught, if you would like to watch the teachings you can do so on Rumble (https://rumble.com/user/SpokaneBibleChurch) or on YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLtV_KhFVZ_waBcnuywiRKIyEcDkiujRqP).

Jeremy Thomas is the pastor at Spokane Bible Church in Spokane, Washington and a professor at Chafer Theological Seminary. He has been teaching the Bible for over 20 years, always seeking to present its truths in a clear and understandable manner. 

Transcript

Intro And The Core Question

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Welcome to Beyond the Walls with Jeremy Thomas and our series on the New Testament framework. Today, the full lesson from Jeremy Thomas. Here's a hint of what's to come.

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Now, because we read descriptions of slavery in the Bible, does that mean that slavery is prescribed as something we are supposed to do? No. Descriptions are descriptions. Prescriptions are prescriptions. Some things that's prescribed is required that we do it. Something that's described is just that. It's a description. And the book of Acts is describing what happened in the early formation of the church. It is not prescribing a specific order or even specific events that have to transpire. If we want to know what is prescribed, we will turn to the epistles, and there we find the prescriptions.

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Is it right to say that the church has four separate beginnings? Where four different groups of people were brought into the church, all with the same magnificent signs? If that's true, that four groups of people were brought in with the same signs, four Pentecosts, then did the church have four beginnings? And if the church had four beginnings in Pentecost, what about every time that a new believer accepts Christ? Is that also a new beginning? Or did the church only begin once? And God, through these signs, through these events recorded in the book of Acts, was demonstrating that the church was for every person in every nation of every tribe and every tongue. Was he instead putting an exclamation point on the unity and diversity of the church that would be preserved throughout all history and all eternity? Let's look and see what the Bible says about the beginning of the church in the book of Acts.

The Four Pentecosts Idea

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Get back to Pentecost. But today it'll be the four Pentecosts. Really, there's only one Pentecost because Acts 2 is the only event that we will study that actually happened on the feast day of Pentecost. But it's often the other days, that is in Samaria and Acts 8, at Cornelius' house in Acts 10, and with the disciples of John in Acts 19, these are sometimes referred to as many Pentecosts. So four Pentecosts or the three many many Pentecosts is what we'll focus on today in the book of Acts. And so I'll be giving somewhat of an overview of the book of Acts this next hour. And this will teach us a lot of things about the defining element in this age, which is the Holy Spirit. And also what we want to look at is not only the similarities between these events in Acts 2, 8, 10, and 19, but also the differences and how this shows us that Acts is a transitional book. Acts is a transitional book. One of the uh great questions is for those of us in theology circles who are dispensational, which basically means that God administers history different ways in different time periods of history. Is the the question, what are the most important books for dispensationalism? In other words, that help us understand how God administers history. And um I remember Dr. Pentecost in some of his lectures would bring this question up with his students in seminary and say, what are the two, what do you think are the two most important books for dispensationalism? And he said, I usually would get the answer the books Daniel, and Revelation. You say, that's that's the wrong answer, right? Those are great books. But the two most important books for dispensationalism are the Gospel of Matthew and the Book of Acts. And the reason is because the Gospel of Matthew shows why there is this thing called the church. Because why? Well, because he came to Israel and he offered the kingdom to Israel, but they rejected the kingdom. And therefore, as a result, the church is now being built. And so there is a transition from Israel and the kingdom and those types of things to the church, the body of Christ, what we are now experiencing. And so Matthew explains why you have this thing called the church, and it's because Israel rejected their Messiah. Acts explains the transition from Israel and the kingdom offered to the church as the body of Messiah. So without these two books, you really would be completely lost if you think about it. If you excluded these two books from the Bible, you would be extremely confused. Especially Acts, because you're moving from the death and the resurrection at the end of the Gospels to just the epistles. You would have no description of what transpired on the day of Pentecost with Peter and the other 11 and then Paul. You would have no explanation of this, it would just be completely out of the box. So this book is critical to explaining the transition from Israel and the kingdom offer to the church and the body of Messiah. So

Why Acts Matters For Transition

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we will be mainly in the book of Acts. And if you'll take a look, we've already, of course, seen this verse, but let's look at Acts 1.8 again. Acts chapter 1, verse 8. This is the verse that is often used to outline the book. And it's a geographical outline. The outline of the book divides around this statement in Acts 1.8 that Jesus made. He says, But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you shall be my witnesses both in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and even to the remotest part of the earth. So Jerusalem is covered in this book in chapters 1 through 7. Judea and Samaria are covered in the section chapters 8 through 12, and then the remotest parts of the earth are covered in chapters 13 through 28. And of course, on down to our own day. This book really only takes us to about 62 or 63 A.D. But then, of course, this expansion, this geographical expansion continues, and we're we are definitely at the remotest part of the earth here in America. So that gives you basically a geographical outline of the book of Acts. And what's there's some interesting observations to be made about it. First of all, when Jesus was crucified and risen, and he made his appearances, and then he gave them the Great Commission, right? In the Great Commission, if we look at the Matthew version, it says, Go to all nations and make disciples of them, right? If we look at the Mark, it says, the Mark version it says, preach the gospel to all creation. Did they do that? Were they interested in doing that in the book of Acts? If you look at the first seven chapters, I mean, where did they go? Nowhere. Even when we get to chapter 8, which we'll read, you'll see that while there are some Jews who went out beyond Jerusalem, it says, Except the apostles. The apostles didn't go. And they were the ones who received the Great Commission, right? So there's an interesting thing transpiring in the book of Acts. It's almost like some people have called the book the Acts of the Holy Spirit. Because if it was left up to Peter, he probably never would have left Jerusalem. So the Holy Spirit is nudging and pushing them out. And so we'll watch how he forces the expansion. In the midst of this, you're going to watch the gospel go from Jerusalem here and just, let's just say, spiral out into the region of Judea and Samaria around Jerusalem. And then, of course, it just keeps going out, mostly west, north and west, right? But it's the idea of the expansion happening in these greater, uh, ever greater spirals. There are even implications like in Acts chapter 8 that with the Ethiopian eunuch. Remember that guy? He came from what is modern day Sudan, and he was obviously a Gentile, and he had come up to Jerusalem to worship the God of Israel. And of course, he leaves and goes back. Now we don't have the rest of that story. It's not covered in the book of Acts. So there's a southward movement too, but we just don't know. But the expansion did go that direction. So we want to watch the spiraling out of the church, how things grow from Jerusalem to Judea and Samaria, and then of course to the remotest parts of the Roman Empire, and now even down to our own day, to the whole, all the regions of the earth.

Three Kinds Of Church Growth

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So in the process of viewing this, there are three types of growth that I like to point out that transpire in the early church, which I think are the three types of growth that the Holy Spirit wants to produce in the world by means of Christ, who's building it by means of his spirit. He said, I will build my church. He's doing that by means of his spirit. So there is numerical growth, meaning more and more people becoming believers. Notice on the day of Pentecost, Acts chapter 2, verse 41, after Peter preached that very interesting sermon, right, that explained the tongues phenomena as being an outpouring of the Spirit that produced those foreign languages, right? And then Peter gives this wonderful sermon, which 68% of which is Old Testament quotations to the men of Israel who were there for the Feast of Pentecost. And basically in this sermon he says, you know, Jesus, the Nazarene, you know, the despised one, who is he is the Messiah, and he did these things, and you crucified him, but God raised him. And so it's this great sermon about their outlook on the Messiah versus God's outlook on Jesus. And so they had crucified him, but God had raised him. They had rejected him, but God had approved of him. And they need to make a decision. And as a result of that, there is a numerical increase in the church. You notice here in chapter 2, verse 41. It says, So then those who had received his word, that's Peter's word, were baptized. And that day there were added about 3,000 souls. That's probably better than most Billy Graham, you know, get togethers, right? That's a lot of people that became believers. Verse 44 says, and all those who had believed were together and had all things in common. I always point that verse out because many people are very confused about 238, where Peter said, Repent and each of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. They're all concerned about that. They're confused and think, well, you've got to be water baptized. This is like the favorite verse of every church of Christ. It's in their top 100. It's the number one in the top 100 verses. But if you notice, verse 44 doesn't say anything about all that stuff. It just says they believed. And there's a reason for that. We're not doing a lot of theology right now, just describing that the fact that there was a numerical increase of 3,000 on that day that believed. So that's one type of growth. You can move over to chapter 4, verse 4. See another numerical increase or report. And also, of course, they will see they believed. But many of those who had heard the message believed, and the number of the men came to be about 5,000. So that doesn't include women and children, does it? It just includes men. My estimate is at this time is about 20 to 25,000 by this point had believed in these early chapters of the book of Acts. And we can go on, chapter 6, verse 7. Interesting statement here of the numerical increase. It's often overlooked, forgotten. One of the groups that is opposed to Jesus in the Gospels are the Sadducees, and yet look right here what we see. It says the word of God kept on spreading, and the number of the disciples continued to increase greatly in Jerusalem, and a great many of the priests were becoming obedient to the faith. And the priests were typically Sadducees. So they were no longer sad, you see, because they became obedient to the faith. And that means, of course, that they had believed the command to believe. Okay, so there's numerical increase. That's one way in which the church grows through the book of Acts. It's a healthy way for the church to grow. We should be growing, you know, numerically today. Second type of growth is geographical. That's obvious from just the outline in Acts 1.8, right? Begin in Jerusalem, then go to Judea and Samaria, and then to the remotest parts of the earth. So there's a geographical expansion or growth, and that is indicated throughout the book of Acts. It's very, very healthy. That means this type of growth requires, of course, numerical growth. You have to have people who become believers in new areas, new geographical regions. So it also includes, then, in addition to people, it includes the planning of churches. That's important to duplicate yourself, right? And then the last type of growth, of course, is spiritual growth. We can see that in chapter 4, verse 31 to 32. 4, 31 to 32. Notice the descriptions of what it looks like when you have believers growing. It says, and when they had prayed, the place for first of all prayer, that's the theme this year, right? So here they are corporately together praying. The place where they had gathered together was shaken, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit. That's related to spiritual growth. And they began to speak the word of God with boldness. That's an aspect of spiritual growth. Speaking of boldness. And the congregation of those who believed were of one heart and soul, meaning unity. They had unity. And not one of them claimed that anything belonged to him was his own, but all things were common property to them. And so, anyway, this is their outlook toward others, toward giving. All these are related, of course, to spiritual growth, and it's just an example from the book of Acts of a description of this third type of growth. Look over to Acts 6, 10 as well. You can see in Stephen in the early church, tremendous apologists for the Christian faith. He says in chapter 6, verse 10, but they were unable to cope with the wisdom and the spirit with which Stephen was speaking. So he was able to articulate the Word of God in such a way that the students of rabbinic Judaism could in no way compete with him. And that's because he had tremendous spiritual growth. So this is just an example of the third type of growth that was occurring in the early church. And these are all healthy and important aspects of spirit of growth that we want to see transpire. Christ said he would build his church. I believe it requires these three types of building, right? Numerical building, geographical expansion building, and spiritual building.

Major Shifts From Israel To Church

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Again, Acts is a transitional book, right? And we've already discussed the two most important dispensational books are Matthew and Acts. But notice some of the transitions. This is just a short list, there's more. But you have the transition from Christ being present in Acts 1 to the Spirit being present in Acts 2 and following. By the way, does that I've thought more and more about this one transition in the last few days than I have any of the other transitions? Many people think the kingdom is now, but I was thinking about this just this point. Would Christ's kingdom be now if Christ isn't even present as the king? That doesn't make any sense at all. And yet many, many churches believe they are building the kingdom and all these types of things. No, there's no kingdom now. The kingdom was for Israel, and it was rejected, and the king left, and the king will not return until Israel says, Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. And when they say that, then the king will come, and that's when the kingdom will begin. But right now, something else has begun, and it's begun with the Spirit whom he sent. And so that is one of the transitions in the book of Acts. All of the Gospels is basically stories about Christ, Christ, Christ, because he's present. But then all of a sudden he's absent, and a new thing begins in Acts, and he's absent, and the Spirit is present. And so this book is Spirit, Spirit, Spirit. And our epistles are spirit, spirit, spirit. So this should be quite obvious, but for some reason this isn't commonly seen. Second transition we see transpiring in the book of Acts is the transition from Israel to the church. Obviously, Israel and their king came to Israel, and they did not receive their king. They rejected him, they crucified him. And then he rose because God approved of him. And now something new has begun, this thing called the church. But, but in the book of Acts, they, Peter and Peter do not understand. Nobody really understands early on this thing called the church. And so we're going to go through the book of Acts today quickly to see how they realize that the church has begun and that God's purposes for Israel have sort of been set on the back burner temporarily. And in that temporary time, he's going to build something new called the church. So that's something they have to realize. A third transition that is transpiring, of course, is the kingdom, the kingdom offer, as I just mentioned to Israel, which was rejected. And now we have this thing that's not a kingdom, it's a body. It's called a building that's being built for the spirit to indwell, you know, things like that. But we're all preparing for the kingdom, of course, in the future. But this is not the kingdom. We're a body. And then lastly, an interesting shift transpires in the book of Acts, this transition from a Jewish majority to a Gentile majority. Obviously, early Acts, Acts 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, these are all chapters that are basically just focused on Jewish believers who have been brought into the body of Christ. It's not till chapter 8 that you get to this group called the Samaritans, those who had unverifiable lineage back in the days of Ezra and so forth, after the Assyrian captivity. And so this is they're very you know reticent to accept Samaritans, right? Uh Jews and Samaritans didn't they didn't exactly rub shoulders well. They didn't hang out together. And then chapter 10, it's even worse, right? Because these are Gentiles. I mean they're just dogs, right? I mean they're meaning they're unclean. That was an unclean animal, and Jews didn't have puppy dogs running around their house like we do. That would be considered unclean. So um they gave that moniker to Gentiles. They were the dogs, unclean. Why? Why were they unclean? Well, because they ate unclean things. Um they ate outside of the Jewish kosher menu, and so um they were considered by Jews to be unclean. But as we'll see, Jesus kind of prepared the way for this beginning Jewish majority to ultimately shift in this thing called the body or the church to being a Gentile majority. And that has some tremendous implications for early church history, but we're not studying that yet.

Tongues As A Unity Sign

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Um let's look at chap these four Pentecosts. Two we've already looked at, right? This is the day, the actual day of Pentecost, Feast of Pentecost was being celebrated, and all. On that day, Jews who had believed were baptized by the Holy Spirit. And this indicated that Jews are brought into the church. In your second row, in Acts 8, we'll study the Samaritans. They, in that chapter, are those who believe are baptized by the Holy Spirit. And by so they were brought into the church. And then in Acts 10, you have Gentiles baptized by the Holy Spirit. And by that they were brought into the church. And then in Acts 19, you have disciples of John that are baptized by the Holy Spirit. And those disciples of John are thereby brought into the church. So what you'll see is by this chart is that whenever a group is baptized by the Holy Spirit, it means that that group is brought into the church. Interestingly, these are the four sections or four groups that experience tongues in the book of Acts. So the tongues was an indicator that a new group was being baptized into the church. Now we may not see why this is so important. Like, who cares? Big deal. Yeah, we know. But it was a really big deal for Jews because Jews did not mingle with Samaritans, Jews did not mingle with Gentiles, and so forth. And you also in the Gospels had an interesting group that never splintered away from John the Baptist and turned their allegiance to Christ. So you still have disciples of John the Baptist running around in the ancient world all the way into Acts 19. So what about these, let's just say these four groups? How are you going to get these four groups together? That's that's the issue. Well, if they all experience the same phenomena, meaning baptism of the Spirit, as evidenced by tongues, then it will evidence that these are not going to be four different churches, but they're all going to be one church. And that is, in fact, the definition of the body of Christ. It's Jew and Gentile in one body. So let's look at a little bit more in Acts 2 through 7.

Jerusalem Church And Stephen’s Martyrdom

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We've already seen the day of Pentecost, Peter. And um the church is going to grow in this period, but it's not going to grow geographically. They're stuck in Jerusalem. But it is growing spiritually, it is growing numerically, as we saw. And you've got Stephen, he's the first martyr, and his introduction is in chapter 6, verse 8. This guy was a diaspora Jew, meaning he was not a native of the land. He was from outside the land. And it seems like the diaspora Jews who believed in the early pages of Acts are more interested in going out. Okay. They're seeing the greater repercussions of Christ in the cross, that it's more than just for Israel. They see it, it seems, more than the natives, like Peter and so forth. So he, of course, has to give his great uh historical recital in chapter 7, where he's defending himself before the Sanhedrin. And by the end of that, of course, you have him being stoned, and you have Saul standing there, right? So you have this in chapter 8, verse 1, as Stephen is stoned, and he, of course, uh falls asleep, and his yields up his spirit and falls asleep. You see in chapter 8, verse 1, the introduction of Saul, we later know as Paul. Saul was in hearty agreement with putting him to death. And it

Samaria And Simon The Magician

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was says it was on that day that a great persecution began against the church in Jerusalem. And they were all scattered throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria. You'll remember that from Acts 1.8, right? They were in Jerusalem, but now it's going to go to Judea and Samaria. And it's not really by their will, uh, the church's will. I mean, you'll see that they were scattered. See, they were forced out into the regions of Judea and Samaria. It says, Except the apostles. They were snug as a bug in Jerusalem. They didn't want to do this Gentile or Samaritan thing. Okay. And then you have the burial of Stephen. In verse 3, Saul begins ravaging the church, entering house after house, and dragging off men and women, he would put them in prison. So verse 4, those who had been scattered went about preaching the word. And here you have a guy named Philip. And he's the first, he breaks ground here because he goes to the city of Samaria, and he began proclaiming the Messiah to them. And the crowds were giving attention to what was being said by Philip as they heard and saw the signs which he was performing. These authenticated that he had the true message of God. For in the case who had unclean spirits, they were coming out of them, shouting out with a loud voice, and many who had been paralyzed and lame were healed, so there was much rejoicing in the city. But now we have his counter, okay, his opponent. It says, verse 9 There was a man named Simon, and he formerly was practicing magic in the city and astonishing the people of Samaria, claiming to be someone great, and they all, from smallest to greatest, were giving attention to Simon, saying, This man is what is called the great power of God. And they were giving him attention because he had for a long time astonished them with his magic arts. But when they believed Philip, preaching the good news about the kingdom of God in the name of Jesus the Messiah, they were being baptized, men and women alike. So here you have the first believers at Samaria, and they're responding to the gospel. They're, first of all, by faith, right? And then they're being baptized, and I'm going to show you the sequence later on. I've got a chart that shows you the sequence in Acts 2, Acts 8, Acts 10, and Acts 19. Actually, and also Acts 9, because that's where Paul is converted. But so we'll even throw him in the mix to see the order of events. When did they believe? When were they baptized by the Spirit? Did they speak in tongues or not? Were they did they have hands laid on them or not? There's a point to all this that we want to make. But here you have Samaritans believing, they're being baptized, water baptized. Verse 13, even Simon himself believed. Yeah, most commentators will tell you that he didn't really believe. Most good commentators will tell you he didn't really believe. But Luke said by means of the Holy Spirit that even Simon himself believed. So even if every commentator in the world said they didn't believe, who would be the majority? Those who believe that he believed, or those who believe that he didn't believe? See, the word of God is the truth, whether people believe it or not. Even Simon himself believed. And whenever a person believes, they're credited with the perfect righteousness of Jesus Christ. Now, what if they show later that they didn't have the right kind of Christian behavior? Does that change the fact that they believed? No. The text says he believed, and it says that Simon was also baptized. And it says after being baptized, he continued on with Philip as he observed signs and great miracles taking place. He was constantly amazed. He was a magician, but he was amazed by these things. Now, when the apostles in Jerusalem heard that Samaria had received the word of God, they sent them Peter and John. So this is to authenticate. Like, what's going on in Samaria? We need somebody who is reputable to go and check things out. So they send Peter and John. They came down, they prayed for them that they might receive the Holy Spirit. So these are people who had believed, right? And even been water baptized, but they had not been baptized by the Spirit, had they? Now you've got to imagine it took a few days for them to walk up to Samaria. So here you have believers who have not been baptized by the Spirit. It says, verse 16, for he had not yet fallen upon any of them. They had simply been baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. So they'd believed, been baptized, and that's it. Then they began laying their hands on them, and they were receiving the Holy Spirit. Now, when Simon saw that the Spirit was bestowed through the laying on of the apostles' hands, he offered them money. Okay, now this is the reason people say, Well, he didn't really believe, see. But notice that Simon saw something. It doesn't say anything about they began speaking in tongues or anything like that. But there was something visual. We're not told what it was. I suspect that they did speak in tongues. But we're not told that explicitly anywhere here. But something happened, something visual at least, was uh seen. So um now he wants to offer them money. So, verse 19, you know, give this authority to me as well, so that everyone on whom I lay my hands may receive the Holy Spirit. But Peter said to him, May your silver perish with you, because you thought you could obtain the gift of God uh with money. You know, you you can't obtain this ability.

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Okay.

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You have no part or portion in this matter or this ministry. You know, this isn't your ministry. This is the apostles and extensions of their ministries through people like Philip and Stephen, but this isn't your ministry. Why? Because your heart is not right before God. So the guy believed, but he was not right with God. He was not walking with God. Now that that's pretty normal, actually, for most people who believe the gospel for the first time, because they don't know what they're supposed to do after that anyway. So they just keep living the same way they lived before. In other words, your lives don't instantly change, right? Um verse 22, what does Simon need to do? Repent of this wickedness of yours and pray the Lord that if possible, this intention of your heart may be forgiven you. Because you're in the gall of bitterness, you're in the bondage of iniquity, you're still in the chains of your iniquity, he says. But Simon answered and said, You pray to the Lord for me yourselves, so that none of what you have said may come upon me. In other words, he says, Well, my goodness, if I'm that bad, maybe you should just pray for me. And uh, we often do that as believers with a week, you know, I'm not really fit to pray for myself. Can you pray for me? You know, this is the type of thing. So the gospel spread out, right? You you've got it starting in Jerusalem, and now it's moved up into the Samaritan region, and of course, it had also spread into Judea, as we find out later in the book of Acts. But no reports of that yet.

Cornelius And Gentiles Receive The Spirit

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Now let's go over to chapter 10. Paul is converted in chapter 9, and then you come to chapter 10, and this is here we go with one of the apostles who was snug as a bug in Jerusalem, right? Not excited about going out, but he has been making some movement in chapter 10. Um, I'm sorry, the end of chapter 9. And he's in a region over on the coast known as Joppa, very close to where you know Jonah got on a book with uh a boat with some Phoenician sailors and set sea, set to sea centuries before. And that's kind of where Peter was. In the midst of all this, he's he's up at this little place north there called Caesarea. Caesarea is right on the coastline, it's a very beautiful place. And um that's a place where a man named Cornelius lived. And so basically, Peter's got to get to Caesarea. And there's a series of visions and so forth. But the fact that Peter is now going to go to a Gentile centurion's home, a man named Cornelius, right, who was overseeing a group of men called the Italian cohort, a group of soldiers, um, is remarkable. So what we're seeing now is if we've already seen the Jerusalem Pentecost and we've seen the Samaritan Pentecost, we're going now to what might be called the Gentile Pentecost, right? So through a series of visions and so forth that both Cornelius had and Peter had, Peter has this interesting vision that convinces him that Gentiles are no longer to be called unholy and unclean. It's the vision where there he was on the rooftop, it was about time to eat lunch, and this white sail came down out of the sky, and in it were all sorts of clean and unclean foods, kosher and non-kosher, just all thrown into the same sail. And and Peter looked at that and he said, I'm not gonna eat that. You know, the voice said, Rise and eat. And he said, No, I'm not gonna eat that. And then he saw the whole thing again, right? And he said, Rise and eat. And Peter said, I'm not gonna eat that. Are you crazy? I've never eaten that since I was born. Never eating that stuff. And then of course it happened again, rise and eat. And he said, No. And the voice said, Well, God has declared clean, no longer considered unclean, right? And this was preparatory for this man because there was no way he was ever gonna step foot across the threshold of a Gentile household unless he was convinced that they were not unclean. And uh Peter was pretty smart. Um if you read this whole account, you'll see that he took six Jewish men with him when he went to this centurion's house. How many witnesses did you need to have under Jewish law? Two or three, right? Two or three witnesses. He took six. Uh he was taking no chances because he knew that before he ever even got back to Jerusalem, the word would get back to Jerusalem before him, and he would be met at the gates of Jerusalem, and he would be stoned. Outside the city. Because they would not permit him to come into the city and bring his uncleanliness inside the city. So, and in fact, he is. He is met by Jews outside the city toward the end of chapter 11, and he has to explain the whole thing about the vision that I just explained to you and what happened. So we're going to look at what happened here at Cornelius' house in chapter 10, in verse 34, where Peter has already stepped across the threshold into their house, and Cornelius is there with all of his loved ones and friends. And opening his mouth, Peter said, I most certainly understand now that God is not one to show partiality, but in every nation, the one who fears him and does what is right is welcome to him. That's an interesting verse for Calvinism to try to deal with. What I mean there is that these people are not believers, okay? Um, but they are positive to God, which is very interesting. Okay. They are fearing God, and they're doing what is right, according to Peter. Now that can't merit salvation, but God is now sending someone to them, right? To give them the message by which they can be saved. So, verse 36: the word which he sent to the sons of Israel, preaching peace through Jesus Christ, that's peace with God, through Christ. He is Lord of all. You yourselves know the thing which took place throughout all Judea. I mean, these people knew. They lived in Caesarea, it's right there by Jerusalem. Starting from the Galilee, and after the baptism which John proclaimed, he says, You know Jesus of Nazareth. You know the despised one we talked about last week. How God anointed him with the Holy Spirit and with power, and how he went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with him. We are witnesses of all these things, said Peter. Things that he did both in the land of the Jews and in Jerusalem, and they also put him to death by hanging him on a cross. God raised him on the third day and granted that it become visible. Now, what he's doing, he's preaching the gospel, right? The death and the resurrection. The death and the resurrection. These are essential core components to the gospel. Verse 41 not to all the people was he visible, but to witnesses who were chosen beforehand by God. That is, to us who ate and drank with him after he arose from the dead. So we saw him as physical body, he was eating, he was drinking, it wasn't a ghost, it was a physical resurrection body. And he ordered us to preach to the people and solemnly to testify that this is the one who has been appointed by God as judge of the living and the dead. Look, the gospel does come with a threat. I mean, if he's risen, well, first of all, he's undefeated. He's undefeatable. He's inconquerable. I mean, if you keep, if you kill the guy and he comes back, I mean, what are you gonna do? I mean, you're done, right? Um, so he's been appointed to be the judge. I mean, if a person's not right with God and they die physically, that's it. They will ultimately face the judge. And um, that's not a very tantalizing thought if you're not right with God. So he has been appointed to be the judge of the living and the dead. Verse 43 of him all the prophets, Old Testament prophets, bear witness that through his name everyone who believes in him receives the forgiveness of sins. Now, while Peter was still speaking these words, what happened? He's just speaking, he's just preaching his sermon. Right? As that is happening, the Holy Spirit fell upon all those who were listening to the message. Now, these are Gentiles. These are who Peter thought previously were unclean. I mean, how can the Holy Spirit fall upon somebody who's unclean? See? And all the circumcised believers who came with Peter, I told you there were six of them, right? Mentioned six over in chapter 11. They were what? They were amazed. Because the gift of the Holy Spirit had been poured out on the Gentiles also, for they were hearing them speaking with tongues and exalting God. So the order was Peter was preaching, they were hearing it, right? They believed, and while they he was still speaking, the Holy Spirit fell upon them and they began to speak in tongues, right? And then Peter says, Well, surely no one can refuse the water for these to be baptized who have received the Holy Spirit just as we did, you know, just as we Jews did, can he? And he ordered them to be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ. Then they asked him to stay on for a few days. So this is the Gentile Pentecost in Acts chapter 10. And at this time, these Gentiles who believed were brought into the body of Christ, the church. Now

Jerusalem Council On Grace

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we go to the Council of Jerusalem real quick. This is not one of the Pentecosts, but I thought it was important. If you look at chapter 15, verse 1, this is the first church council in church history. They later have other church councils like Nicaea, Constantinople, and so forth. Um, but this is the first one. And the issue was does a Gentile to be right with God need to be circumcised and put himself under the law of Moses? That was the issue. You have some Jews saying, yes, they need to. You can see it here in chapter 15, verse 1. Some men came down from Judea and began teaching the brethren, unless you are circumcised according to the custom of Moses, you can't be saved. So, do these Gentiles who are coming to salvation, do they need, in order to be right with God and really be saved, do they need to be circumcised and put themselves under the law of Moses? Verse 5 expresses a similar idea. But some of the sect of the Pharisees who had believed stood up, saying, It is necessary to circumcise these Gentiles and to direct them to observe the law of Moses. So they came to look into the matter, verse 6, and notice verse 7, after there had been much debate, Peter stood up, he said to them, Brethren, you know that in the early days God made a choice among you that by my mouth the Gentiles would hear the word of the gospel and believe. Now that's Acts 10, that's what we just studied at Cornelius' house, right? And God, who knows the heart, testified to them, giving them the Holy Spirit, just as he also did to us, and he made no distinction between us and them. He cleansed their hearts by faith. In other words, we Jews were circumcised, they were not. And yet the Holy Spirit fell upon them in just the same way that he did to us, and he cleansed their hearts, just as he cleansed our hearts the same way by what? By faith. Now, therefore, he asked, Why do you put God to the test by placing upon the neck of the disciples, these Gentiles, a yoke which neither our forefathers nor we have been able to bear? In other words, why are you now trying to put them under the law of Moses? We couldn't bear that weight. Think they can. But we believe, verse 11, that we are saved through the grace of the Lord Jesus in the same way as they also are. See, salvation is always by grace through faith. You don't have to come into Judaism by getting circumcised and putting yourself under the law of Moses in order to be saved or to be right with God. Now that argument ultimately ends up winning the day. James adds his argument, which is the stronger of the two, but together they all agree. So you come down to verse 19, and the only thing that is laid upon the Gentile believers is certain cultural concessions for the time. So James says in verse 19, therefore it is my judgment that we do not trouble those who are turning to God from among the Gentiles. So to turn to God is equivalent to here believing by grace, right? So he says, we shouldn't trouble them, you know, except this. We write to them that they abstain from, and there's four things here: things contaminated by idols, in other words, don't eat food sacrificed to idols. Fornication, which here is in terms of Levitical law, meaning don't have close intermarriages. Gentiles tended to do that, whereas the Levitical law said, you know, it put boundaries on who you could marry, as far as kin. Gentiles married much closer. This would be a great offense to Jewish believers, because this is built up in their conscience, you shouldn't do that. So that's the second thing they should abstain from. Third, from what is strangled, you weren't supposed to eat strangled things, and from blood. You weren't supposed to drink blood. Gentiles did all these things, but what James is saying is hey, we're all saved. We've all received the Holy Spirit. Some of us are uncircumcised, some of us are circumcised, some of us are Gentiles, some of us are Jews, but we're all saved, right? By grace through faith. But for this time being, because of Jewish conscience being repelled by these four things, let's encourage the Gentile believers to not engage in these things. Because we need to have unity in the body of Christ. And this was essential early on for that unity to actually take place. So we've seen the Jewish Pentecost, Acts 2, the Samaritan Pentecost, Acts 8, and the Gentile in Acts 10. And in all cases, those who had believed were baptized by the Holy Spirit on that day, which put them in the church, and it was proven by the tongues. Now we turn to the last group, that's Acts 19. And this

Disciples Of John In Ephesus

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is the group that were still running around the Mediterranean world who were disciples of John the Baptist. They had never transferred their belief or put their faith in Jesus for one reason or another. These guys, in particular, because they never, they were in the land, they heard John preach at the Jordan River, they were baptized by John, which was a baptism of repentance that Paul talks about here. But they didn't stick around long enough in the land to ever see the one that John pointed to as the Messiah. So they never knew that they were supposed to believe in Jesus as the Messiah. And so they were still disciples of John. It happened, verse 1, while Apollos was at Corinth, Paul passed through the upper country and he came to Ephesus. So if you go back, you see, wow, look what's happening. Don't forget about the map. Remember Acts 1.8? Jerusalem, Judea, and Samaria, and to the remotest parts of the earth. Now we're over here by Ephesus. So it is growing, it's expanding geographically. So he found some disciples there. And he said to them, I mean, he's a little confused, like, what who is who are these people? Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed? That's the key question. And they said to him, No, we have not even heard whether there is a Holy Spirit. Actually, that's a I would translate this differently. I would say, with the translation from the original is, we have not even heard whether the Spirit has been given. They knew about the Holy Spirit. He's in the Old Testament. That's not the point. The point is they did not know that the Holy Spirit had been given yet. The Messiah was to do a baptism of the Spirit. But they didn't know that this had transpired yet. And he said, Into what then were you baptized? And they said, Well, into John's baptism. So this is how we know they were disciples of John. And Paul said, John baptized with the baptism of repentance. Right? And we all know that from the Gospels, right? Um, that he was down at the Jordan. People would go out from Jerusalem and various parts of the area, and uh to see this strange thing, this guy who eats locusts and dressed strangely and lives out in the wilderness, and he's baptizing people. Who is this guy? And uh it was a baptism of repentance. Now, Paul tells us what the repentance was all about right here. This is what John's baptism was all about. It was telling the people to believe in him who was coming after him. So, whoever is baptized by John, what were they saying? They were saying, Well, whenever you point out who the Messiah is, we're gonna believe in him. Okay. That is in Jesus. Now, when they heard this, when these guys heard this, these disciples of John, they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. So obviously they believed in him. That's what they said they were gonna do when they were baptized by John. So they believed in him, they were water baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus, and when Paul had laid his hands upon them, the Holy Spirit came on them, and they began speaking with tongues and prophesying, and there were in all about twelve men. Okay, so a whole series of things happened there. Those are the four um Pentecosts, one big Pentecost and three mini Pentecost. Now, um, having said all that, Jewish Samaritan, Gentile, uh Council of Jerusalem saying, Hey, look, we're saved by grace through faith, the Holy Spirit, he's cleansed. The hearts of even uncircumcised Gentiles, no problem. Now we've got disciples of John the Baptist. This could have formed an alternative church, right? But since all these people groups experience the same exact thing, then they were all being put into the exact same thing. That is the body of Christ, which is the church. And what this is ultimately pointing to is the equality of spiritual privilege that all believers have. Which this is different from the period of Old Testament Israel. In Old Testament Israel, everyone did not have equal spiritual privileges. Um the priests had the greatest spiritual privileges. The high priest himself had direct access to God in the most holy place where the Ark of the Covenant rested. Nobody else in Israel could go in there unless you want to die. A suicide mission. Right? Um, but then the other priests who functioned in the court with the sacrifices, they had greater privilege than the average male, right? Because they were could be closer to God. God was located in a place in the Old Testament. That's what Jesus is getting at with the Samaritan woman in John 4, right? The Samaritans are saying, Well, we worship here in Mount Gerizim, and the Jews, but the Jews say they're in Jerusalem. And Jesus said, Hey, a time is coming when it'll be neither here nor there, but all will worship me in spiritual truth. He was predicting exactly what I'm talking about. This idea of equal spiritual privilege that we have in the body of Christ. That's why Galatians 3.28 says, There's neither male nor female, slave nor free, right? For we are all one in Christ. It's talking about the spiritual privileges that we now have. All of us. So this is a dispensational shift. This is a major shift in how things work in spirituality in our spiritual lives. Okay. So those four groups would all be put in the same body and have equal spiritual privileges.

Why Tongues Is Not Normalized

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Now, here are some conclusions. Okay, first of all, the four Pentecosts, Acts 2, you should memorize these, Acts 2, 8, 10, 19, right? All associated with tongue speaking, which signifies what? Jews, Samaritans, Gentiles, and disciples of John the Baptist, all received the Holy Spirit, all baptized by the Spirit into one body, that is the one and only true church.

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Okay.

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So the church, in its grandest definition, is every believer, both in the world and departed from the world at death, from the day of Pentecost until this present moment. That is the body of Christ of the church. This was critical to stopping each group from forming a rival church. And the emphasis in all the groups is receiving the Holy Spirit. This is like nothing you will read in the Old Testament, right? I mean, there's nothing in the Old Testament like this. So something different has begun. A second major conclusion. Tongues happened once for each group and did not ever happen again. I mean, there are other Jews that get saved, there's other Samaritans that get saved, as Philip goes throughout Samaria. There are other Gentiles who get saved, like the Ethiopian eunuch, like the people that Paul goes to in Acts 13 and 14. Never, ever, ever again do you ever see any of those groups ever speaking in tongues. Isn't that interesting? Why didn't they get tongues? But these other four times it did happen. Because this was significant for introducing a new group into the body of Christ. It signified that. It didn't need to happen again. Once that group was introduced to the body of Christ, you don't need to introduce them again to the body of Christ. After that, every person of that people group that believes enters the body of Christ. And they don't need tongues to evidence that. Why I say that's important? Well, because the modern tongues movement, the charismatic movement, wants to normalize tongues. Like if you're really a believer, you'll speak in tongues. Or if you receive the second baptism of the Spirit, they get into second baptisms of the Spirit and all this other stuff. The Spirit being given to you for power, then you'll speak in tongues, something like that. But all they're trying to do is normalize the book of Acts. What I'm trying to show you is that the events here are not normal. And I'm going to show you why none of these events are the normal events that we are supposed to prescribe for Christian living. So while some things are the same in all these four passages in Acts, such as faith always comes before spirit baptism. That is something you can go and evaluate. And you will see every time they believe, and then they're baptized by the Spirit sometime after. They're never simultaneous. But for example, think of the first one in Acts chapter 2. In Acts chapter 2, let's just think about the 12. Well, the 11. Judas wasn't there, right? But they well, they've got Matthias now, so you do have 12. Think about this. When did those guys believe that Jesus was the Messiah? Years before. Years. But when did they get the Holy Spirit to baptize them? On the day of Pentecost. So here's an example where clearly they believed long before they were baptized by the Spirit. And this is always the order. Okay, faith comes first, then spirit baptism. Even though that's the same, notice other things such as the order of events as well as just what events actually occur on these occasions differs for every group. I'll show you. Okay, so here's what we basically went through, except Paul, but I threw Paul on there just for fun. If you look in Acts 2, they already said they believed years before. On the day of Pentecost, they get spirit baptized, and then the last thing that happens is they speak in tongues. Look at the order for the Samaritans in Acts 8. It's very similar, except there's a different thing added: laying on of hands. So again, they have faith, but they didn't have laying on of hands in Acts 2. But they do in Acts 8. It was a few days later because Peter and John had to be called to go up there from Jerusalem to go check this out. So there's a great uh a few days between faith and spirit baptism. And then lastly, of course, tongue. That manifested that they had actually been baptized by the Spirit. Um, let's look at Paul. His is interesting. Again, faith is first. You can see that row, it's always first. Umanias went there when he was blind, right, and laid hands on him. And then it says he's spirit baptized, and then he was water baptized. And then Acts 10, you have Gentiles, that's Cornelius' house. They have faith. There's no intention of laying on of hands. They're just listening to the sermon, and the Spirit baptizes them, and they begin speaking in tongues, and then after that, they're water baptized. Peter said, Who can who can forbid them from water? And then you have this, this one's totally at wacky in Acts 19. Disciples of John, faith, that's normal. But then look, they're water baptized when they have faith. That's the first thing that happens. Then they get laid on hands, and it's only at that point that they get spirit baptized. And then after that, of course, tongues. Tongues always comes after if it comes at all. Like with Paul, it didn't happen, right? So sometimes it's similar or same order, other times it's different. Sometimes an element is added, like laying on of hands, or tongues is excluded or included. Uh, which is the proper order, which is the way that it actually is supposed to happen all the time. Well, that's the whole point. If you want to try to normalize the book of Acts, which experience are you going to normalize? Which one is the normal Christian experience? Since they all contradict one another, or that some of them contradict, which one are you gonna pick to be the normal one? See? Okay, that's the point. The book of

Descriptive Versus Prescriptive Bible Reading

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Acts is not supposed to be normalized. It's a transitional book. It's not prescribing what must happen, it's describing what did happen. And that's all that it's doing. We're not supposed to make prescriptions in the Bible out of things that are simply descriptions. For example, Robert L. Dabney in the 1800s, in the wake of the Civil War, said that the Bible teaches slavery. And slavery is right, and the South was right. This is just an example, okay? What he had been reading was descriptions of slavery in the Bible. I mean, the whole book of Philamon is about an escaped slave named Onesimus, who Paul encourages to go back to Philamon to make things right. Things like that. Now, because we read descriptions of slavery in the Bible, does that mean that slavery is prescribed as something we are supposed to do? No. Descriptions are descriptions. Prescriptions are prescription. Something that's prescribed is required that we do it. Something that's described is just that. It's a description. And the book of Acts is describing what happened in the early formation of the church. It is not prescribing a specific order or even specific events that have to transpire. If we want to know what is prescribed, we will turn to the epistles, and there we find the prescriptions. And there what we find is that whenever a person believes, they are baptized by the Spirit and put into the body of Christ. And therefore, at that time, they now have equal spiritual privileges with every other believer. It does not say that you're going to experience tongues. It does not say that you must be water baptized. It does not say that you must have hands laid upon you or anything like that. All that it says is that you must believe. And when you believe, you're baptized by the Spirit. And now you have great spiritual privileges, just like every other believer. So it's simple, right? But I'm trying to cut through a lot of the confusion about many of these things. And now what we can do is we can get into the work of the Holy Spirit. And that's going to be exciting in the coming weeks. Okay? We find out his works uh in this age for all believers.

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Thank you

Wrap Up And Next Steps

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for joining us on Beyond the Walls with Jeremy Thomas. If you would like to see the visuals that went along with today's sermon, you can find those on Rumble and on YouTube under Spokane Bible Church. That is where Jeremy is the pastor and teacher. We hope you found today's lesson productive and useful in growing closer to God and walking more obediently with Him. If you found this podcast to be useful and helpful, then please consider rating us in your favorite podcast app. And until next time, we hope you have a blessed and wonderful day.