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Transcript

Good afternoon everyone. Wow, you can’t help but comment about the weather outside, walking in the garden and seeing it finally starting to fill in and showing signs right before it all wilts next week because it’s going to be ninety-five degrees. But, no, I’m kidding. That’s what irrigation’s for.

So here we’re in the afternoon, Pentecost afternoon service, after what have been thousands of Pentecost going back overtime, thousands and thousands and thousands of them. Then something about two thousand, little another two thousand years ago, a very different kind of Pentecost happened. We’ll look at more detail, but a very different Pentecost than all of the ones that came before it.

So is that kind of like the Pentecost we get to experience today? Well, I’m going to have you do something so we’re ready for what it could be. I need you to be absolutely silent. So just give it a second. Okay. Listen for it. Do you hear the rushing wind? No. No, you don’t. Do you hear fire, or smell fire, or see the smoke alarms, or the sprinklers going off because there’s fire? No, very different. Very different than thirty-one AD.

Okay. Let’s try something else. [French language] So did you understand what I just said? If you speak French, you still didn’t understand what I just said, but you didn’t... I spoke the words in French and they didn’t come to you in English. There wasn’t tongues. So very different than thirty-one AD. Very different. But there’s something about today that’s exactly the same as thirty-one AD, the power, God’s spirit that performed all of those incredible miracles is behind empowers and is infused with our spirit today.

It’s the same spirit. But if we go back, rewind a couple thousand years, and look at that New Testament example and that thirty-one AD example, we can learn a lot. So, let’s rewind time back and examine that period then and see what application it can have for you and I today. So, let’s go to Acts chapter two. You may want to put a marker here. We’ll pop back and forth a few times. Acts, chapter two.

Do you know the part I’m most excited about? That we won’t get to a point where that sermon, this sermon gets to be played in the field and therefore all the French-speaking brethren will actually hear it. So Acts chapter two verse one. We’ll start here. Acts two, one, “And when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all with one accord in one place, one accord in one place. And suddenly there came a sound from heaven as of a rushing mighty wind.”

This is verse two, “And it filled all the house where they were sitting. And there appeared unto them cloven tongues like as a fire and it sat upon each of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak with other tongues as the spirit gave them utterance.” That’s when it actually did happen the way I joked about in the introduction, when all of those amazing physical manifestations made that thirty one AD Pentecost unlike any other time in history.

They were together. They were in one place. They were demonstrating a unity and obedience because they were told be together. So go back to the Psalm, book of Psalms one thirty three, excuse me, Psalm one thirty three. So here’s an attribute that that first century Church had. We’re not going to tie it to today yet. We’re just going to examine at the surface level some of these attributes and then we’ll bring it forward to today and some of the things that we can apply both as an overall Church of God, but also in our individual lives. Returning there. Psalm one thirty three verse one.

Verse one reads, “Behold, how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity.” If that wouldn’t have happened, what would have that First New Testament Pentecost look like? If they weren’t collectively anticipating what was going to happen? It’s why Peter got so excited and thought, “Okay. This is it. It’s all starting,” because something so amazing happened that had not been seen before.

After, remember there’d been Pentecost for thousands and thousands of years, but their unity didn’t start on that day. Let’s go back to the New Testament. I said keep your hand there, if you did, Acts chapter one. Acts chapter one. You’ll see this was a pattern. It didn’t start on Pentecost, it started before that as just like today to be ready to be able to experience when this day is fulfilled, we need to be working well in advance of that fulfillment. Acts one and verse fourteen, “These all,” and so all, every single one of them, “Continued.”

This is before that account, “All continued with one accord in prayer and supplication with the women and Mary, the Mother of Jesus, and with his brethren.” They were already in the habit of being together, being unified, having a simple, focused sound and direct approach to what they wanted to do. Their minds were singular. It was consistent even before they had God’s spirit. Because remember, it wasn’t until that moment that they were filled with God’s spirit. It was interesting. The word there is filled.

So what did they have that we didn’t have at baptism? It’s just an amazing, very different picture than what we experience on Pentecost today. It’s wonderful, we get to hear spiritual meat. We share a meal together. We, never mind here, Headquarters, you get to walk the garden and see the beautiful weather and fellowship, and so much that makes this day special. But it’s very different than it was then.

Okay. We’ll go to John chapter three. Remember, there are several things. They were unified and then this happened as well. John chapter three. We’ll start in verse six. John three verse six. Verse six reads, “That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.” Of course, I’m jumping down to verse eight, “The wind blows where it lists and you hear the sound thereof, but you can’t tell where it comes from.” If you hear wind...

Wind’s an amazing thing because it has to bump into something for you to hear where it’s coming from. So it could be blowing from this side or the other, but you’re hearing the noise bouncing off so and so. If I was blowing a wind through this room and it could be blowing from my left to my right, and if it hits that light, I’m going to hear sound there. That’s where the sound’s going to swirl.

But it has nothing... It doesn’t tell me where the wind’s coming from. You have to do the old lick your finger, put it up in the air trick and be like, “Oh, okay, it’s coming from my left.” Whether it goes, continuing in that verse. “So everyone that is born of the spirit.” You can’t see spirit. And on Acts, it was that unity. They were together with one accord and God gave them his spirit.

And brethren, that changed everything. We know as we look at the Old Testament, there are examples of individuals where God’s spirit was given, but not in the way that happened then and then what proceeded for thousands more years to get to where you and I are sitting in chairs today. We have the ability to harness the power that did the amazing things then.

We shouldn’t even look at them as, wow, something like that could never happen today. We never would see fire, the rushing wind or speaking in to... All of the aspects that we look at and we think that’s amazing. You know what’s even more amazing? Those are all physical manifestations of a spirit power. What we have happening in our lives and God’s spirit that touches the human spirit, allows us to change and grow and develop. That’s so, so much more than wind, fire, or you being able to understand my terrible French, so much more. Again, this is not even just new in the first century. Let’s go back to Exodus nineteen. We heard this morning. Exodus nineteen. We’ll read it again. We don’t have to focus on it because we’ve covered in the message this morning. We will read through.

So we’ll start in verse fourteen. Verse fourteen of Exodus nineteen reads, “And Moses went down from the mount unto the people and sanctified the people, and they washed their clothes. And he said unto the people, be ready against the third day, come not at your wives, and it came to pass on the third day in the morning, that there were thunders and lightnings, and a thick cloud upon the mount.”

Again, remember this is a Pentecost. So God does powerful things on this day, and he sets this day up to represent even more powerful things. “And it came to pass on the third day in the morning, that there were thunders and lightnings, and a thick cloud upon the mount, and the voice of the trumpet exceeding loud, so that all the people that was in the camp trembled.”

They were afraid. Hard to blame them. Isn’t it? There’s a mountain that’s shaking and thundering. That’s not something you see often. They just saw a pillar of fire and cloud, and they saw a red sea part. You would think they may be a little bit more used to miracles, but this was still beyond what they were thinking. The mountain is trembling.

Verse seventeen, “And Moses brought forth the people out of the camp to meet with God, and they stood at the nether part of the mount. And mount Sinai was altogether on a smoke, because the Lord descended upon it in fire.” In fire, God symbolized his arrival on that mount with fire. Just like in the New Testament, he symbolized receiving of his power. Him, Christ and God are made up of the Holy Spirit. It is them.

We’ll see a verse later that says, “The Spirit is Christ.” They used fire. “And the smoke thereof ascended as the smoke of a furnace, and the whole mount quaked greatly.” That would’ve been terrifying. Imagine that the rocks, or they had to stand further part away so they wouldn’t get hurt. But God’s presence again then, and a couple of thousand years ago, he symbolized it with fire on this day.

Brethren, the day of Pentecost is not just any other Holy Day where it sits right in the middle between the fall and the spring. It stands out alone, and it’s meant to symbolize we’ve learned so much about it. So often, we’ve talked about, does God going to do something on a day or is he going to use the Holy Day to symbolize the day. Obviously, we’re sitting here. We know God is using this day to symbolize it, but the symbols he uses, the power he uses, the pictures he creates are phenomenal.

Let’s go to Joel chapter two. So fire, smoke. Joel chapter two, and we will jump down deeper into the passage. Verse twenty-seven. Verse twenty-seven of Joel two, “And you shall know that I am in the midst of Israel, and that I am the Lord your God,” looking ahead at time here, “And none else. And my people shall never be ashamed. And it shall come to pass afterward,” again, this is looking ahead, “That I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh.”

It’s not what he did in 31 AD. He poured out his spirit on all of those who were unified, all of those who were of one accord, but is looking ahead to a time when the world will be unified and of one accord. And that’ll allow him to pour out my spirit upon all flesh. “And your sons and your daughters shall prophesy. And your old men shall dream dreams. And your young men shall see visions.”

You could almost say like the New Testament, in tongues. People will speak in tongues. But at that point, will they need to? Maybe that’s why it’s not listed. In verse twenty-nine, “And also upon the servants and on the handmaids in those days I will pour out my spirit.” So everyone is going to get it. All man. Again, this day pictures something great.

So let’s go back to 31 AD. Go back to Acts chapter two. Pick it back up in the account before we start to jump ahead and look at what this means in our modern time. Acts chapter two verse thirty-eight. Verse thirty-eight reads, “Then Peter said unto them, repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.”

This is a little after that. Now they’re starting to see the Church develop and grow, “For the promise is unto you, and to your children, and all that are afar off, even as many as the Lord our God shall call. And with many other words he did testify and exhort, saying, Save yourselves from this untoward generation.” Brethren, we are in a generation today that looks so much more untoward than what it did two thousand years ago.

Verse forty-one, “Then they that gladly received his word, were baptized. And on that same day there were added unto them about three thousand souls.” Three thousand. I tried to read that sometimes when I’m doing Bible study, in just reading you stop and you try to mentally picture what three thousand would be.

I always find stadiums, or one of my favorite ways to do it, you picture a big ball stadium or whatever where they can hold five or ten or fifteen thousand people. And you picture that and you think three thousand people were baptized. As the chapter continues, you realize some of them just went underwater, came right back up, and nothing happened, and others received God’s spirit.

And then verse forty-two, “And they continued steadfastly. They stayed focused in the apostles’ doctrine and fellowship and in the breaking of bread and in prayers.” God’s Church, if we do something that we’ve done well for a very long time is breaking bread for now thousands of years. We just did it today. Wonderful food. Every event we do. We could be doing outside events. We could do our breakfast. We typically are very good at feeding each other, breaking bread, and in prayers.

In verse forty-three, “And fear came upon every soul and many wonders and signs were done by the apostles.” Fear came upon every soul because of what just happened. This is the patterns of Acts as you just see, it develop and grow. Fear, and excitement, and unity, and then other miracles come from it. They devoted, those early disciples, early members of God’s Church if you want to say it that way, they devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching, their fellowship breaking of bread that drew them closer together, that unity, that bond, then it’ll open the door for miracles. Let’s go to Hebrews chapter ten.

Hebrews chapter ten and verse twenty-two. I hear your pages still turning. So it’s verse twenty-two of Hebrews ten. Reads, “Let us draw near with a true heart and full assurance of the faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. Let us hold fast the profession of our faith without wavering for he is faithful that promised. And let us consider one another to provoke,” I love this term, “To provoke unto love and to good works.”

Because provoke in this age is you go to the store and go, “Nah, nah, nah,” and you’re provoking someone to do it. You see kids do it all the time. They provoke each other, usually not to good works and love. We in the modern age have a very negative connotation to that, but it makes it kind of fun to visualize it.

So you kind of picture us going around the room, seeing each other and like, “I dare you to do some good works.” Because that’s kind of what God’s saying. Keep each other on the straight and narrow. Help each other remember to see what our purpose is. What we mean to love each other. To do the things when we fellowship and we work with each other and serve. Verse twenty-five, “Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together as a manner of some, but exhorting each other, and so much the more as you see the day approaching.” It can be said with exclamation points behind it when it’s in this modern age. But it says, “Do the things that get you together. Do items that draw you in fellowship that are able to show love.”

Because remember, anything that has to do with service, fellowship, love, none of those happen in isolation. If you try to apply love in isolation, you’re by yourself in front of a mirror. I love you. That may feel good, but you’re not actually performing what God wants us to do. We have to be around other people to be able to do that. And to be around other people, we have to participate.

We have to sign up for lunches. We have to sign up for volunteer opportunities. We have to sign up for events and socials and anything else we can do so we are around other of God’s people so they and you can provoke each other unto love and to good works. Can’t do it alone. Christianity is not an alone way of life. Even if you’re single or even if you’re married, it can’t be just the two of you either.

Christianity is not an alone way of life. Let’s go to Colossians two. Again, we’re looking at what happened in that first century, and we’ll develop this into larger lessons for us today. Colossians chapter two. But the key, as we keep building this, was they were in the Apostle’s fellowship, the Apostle’s doctrine. They didn’t go off on their own. They didn’t come up with their own ideas because that’s the opposite of unity, the opposite of being of one accord.

Colossians two and verse six reads, “As you have therefore received Christ, Jesus, the Lord, so walk you in him. So walk in Christ, rooted and built up in him and established in the faith as you have been taught.” We could go to so many more verses that talk about that. But as we have been taught, we do the things that we’re taught, and then we apply the things when we learn them.

When you came into God’s way of life, same with me, you may not have known about this, that, or the other doctrine. I think I’ve given this example before. I remember I was slowly getting out of vegetarianism before I was called, and I had gotten to the point where I had eaten everything besides really red meat. So I ate chicken, I introduced everything.

Life was boring, so I needed more things that were flavorful. But I hadn’t had red meat yet. I just thought, “Okay, I’m not going to do it.” Then I remember learning this way of life and reading about clean meat. And that next Sabbath evening, I had a steak the size of Texas. It changed. But before that, I didn’t know. All of us get there. If this is your first Sabbath or you’re new in the faith, there are things you don’t know.

And God doesn’t hold you accountable for them until you know them. And then suddenly you know them, and now you’ve got to apply them. And then as you learn and develop and grow over time, there are going to be new things. Usually it starts out with a lot of the physical stuff. That’s you learn, “Okay, I can’t do that anymore.” You can’t smoke, or again, clean and unclean foods. Or we keep the Sabbath, and I go there on the Sabbath. Over time, that starts to shift.

You get the physical things sorted out, and then we start to learn more spiritual things or items that we have to apply of our character that God shows us. And then the same applies as a physical thing. If we’re seeing things in our character that God is showing us, we have to change them just like we had to stop eating pork. But we learn those as we have been taught. Continuing on that verse. Verse seven continues, “Abounding therein with thanksgiving.”

We have to be rooted in sound teachings as they were in the first century, and then we have to receive them with thanksgiving. That’s an amazing thing because we receive knowledge, and sometimes you can feel overwhelmed with knowledge, can’t you? Just so much knowledge. But God says, “No, receive it with thanksgiving,” because what you have is so precious.

I had an opportunity to do a public Bible lecture where we featured on the Great Lakes region. It really struck me that there were things that I was saying that to me and to you were so basic Christianity, but to people hearing it for the first time were profound. Teachings that they’d never heard in the Baptist Church or the Lutheran Church. There was a change of thinking, just talking about receiving the Kingdom of God or not going to heaven. When do you ever think, “Well, maybe we do go to heaven.”

It never crosses your mind. Maybe we got that wrong. But most people, that’s their default. That’s what their thinking is, and it’s been their thinking in their entire life. So when they hear that, that’s Earth shattering. And it’s so easy to prove with one verse that it can completely change their thinking. But you don’t know what you don’t know.

So that first century Church went on the Apostle’s teaching, fellowship doctrine. They were unified. They were of one accord. They received God’s spirit. And then that opened the door to do things that had not really been seen at the level that they were up to that point. Go to Matthew sixteen.

Matthew Chapter sixteen. Oh, excuse me. Mark sixteen. Mark sixteen. Probably not too far away. Flip over a couple... Mark sixteen. Start in verse nineteen. Verse nineteen reads, “So then after the Lord had spoken unto them, he was received up to heaven and sat on the right hand of God.” Verse twenty, “And they went forth and preached everywhere. And the Lord working with them and confirming the word with signs,” those are miracles that followed them.

So they went out preaching the word of God, went to all these places everywhere. And because of the unity, the one accord, God’s spirit working through them, they had signs, miracles, healings, casting out demons, things that had not been seen until Christ came along and did the miracles himself. And even Christ said, remember, he said, “You will do greater things than I have done.”

Remember, people being healed in Peter’s shadow. So many miracles, wonders. And that just kept developing the Church, didn’t it? From that moment on Pentecost that people came, they obeyed, thousands were baptized, and then miracles, and they saw the miracles and they feared. And sometimes the miracles and the fear didn’t come from the most comfortable place.

Go ahead back to Acts chapter five. The goodness or kindness and severity of God. Acts, chapter five. See, some of these things we witnessed today, we have healings, you have answer of prayers, especially personally. It’s sometimes hard to explain to someone else, especially if they’re not walking this way of life, of when prayers are answered in your life that anyone would say, “Oh, that’s just a coincidence. It all worked itself out.”

But as a Christian, especially if you’ve done it for some period of time, you think, “My life’s full of a lot of coincidences then,” because things just keep working themselves out. But you get more dramatic things like healings. Or the opposite, if you want to instill fear, as we do here. There’s a certain man, verse one, to Acts chapter five, but a certain man named Ananias and his wife, Sapphira, they sold a possession. You know this account, so we’ll jump down to verse ten.

Verse ten reads, “Then fell she down straightway at his feet.” So Ananias already had died. They lied. And when they lied about it, that had a repercussion. It’s amazing because they had the ability to give, in this case, common as they saw fit. So they literally just went forward and said, “Well, I got this piece of land, and it’s worth ten thousand dollars. We’re going to give you everything. And they sell it for fifteen and give them ten. They lied. It’s amazing what God gives us.

This is why God considers truth so important. They gave. They could have given probably a substantial sum because they couldn’t have just said, if let’s say the land, again, is worth ten thousand, and they went and said, “Okay, we’re giving our common. Here’s five shekels.” Everyone looked at him like, “You’re not telling the truth.”

No, they played this game out well enough that they would have looked like they did. But they lied. So he died. And then continuing on in verse ten, “Then she fell straight away and gave up the ghost and died, the spirit. And the young men came in and found her dead, and carrying her forth, buried her by her husband. And great fear came upon the Church. And upon as many who has heard these things.” Not just in the Church, but you can imagine how many times in a day does someone do a little white lie? Maybe this was a little bit bigger than a little white lie, but they lied and died. We serve a God that’s very focused on truth.

That should sober us that this can happen on a couple who still gave a substantial amount of money to the work, but God didn’t care about that. Just like God doesn’t care about common in the sense of the monetary amount today, God cares about common because he wants us to be able to get rid of the things that would hold us back, the things that would give us that parachute, so we go all in on this way of life.

The number doesn’t matter as is the case here, it’s the commitment, the truth that matters. And continuing on in verse twelve, “And by the hands of the apostles were many,” you can say many more, “Many signs and wonders wrought among the people, and they were with one accord in Solomon’s porch.” So fear can come from multiple ways.

It could be respect. It can come from true fear, or it can be seeing God’s power and being in awe of that power. The more I think we, you or I, work to make sure when we exercise fear in our lives, it’s because we awe of God, of what he can do, as opposed to him saying, “I’m going to have to strike some real fear into them. There’s going to be some full bail going on in their lives, not just all of my power.”

Let’s go to First Corinthians twelve. First Corinthians chapter twelve. Again, we’re still just building up here, looking at the 1st century, and then as it’s trickling out, there are definitely lessons for us today. That’s not our focus yet. We’re still just building this up.

First Corinthians chapter twelve and verse one, “Now concerning spiritual gifts, brethren, I would not have you ignorant. You know that they were Gentiles carried away into dumb idols, even as you were led,” we all made mistakes before God called us, “Wherefore, I give you to understand that no man speaking by the Spirit of God calls Jesus a curse, and that no man can say that Jesus is the Lord but by the Holy Spirit.”

Spiritual knowledge requires the Holy Spirit. This day is all about the Holy Spirit. This day is all about the Holy Spirit. Verse four, “Now there are diversities of gifts, but the same Spirit. There are differences of administrations, but the same Lord. There are diversities of operations, but it is the same God which works all in all,” it’s God’s Spirit through the Lord, through Jesus, through God the Father, “but the manifestation of the Spirit is given to every man to profit with all.”

So we saw in the New Testament there, some of the manifestations of the spirit were speaking in tongues, were the mighty wind, and then over time, those signs and wonders, the healings, casting out demons, those are manifestations of the spirit. Because Spirit is spirit, it’s not physical. So, for us to be able to interact in any way besides God’s spirit interfacing with the spirit in man, the only way we can interact with anything in the spirit world itself is for that spirit, angels or demons, or God’s Spirit, Christ or the Father through it, to manifest itself in a physical way.

So, continuing, verse seven, “Is given to every man to profit with all. For to one is given by the Spirit the word of wisdom, to another the knowledge of the same Spirit, word of knowledge. To another, faith by the same Spirit,” it’s all through God’s Spirit, “To another, the gift of healing by the same spirit. To another the working of miracles. To another, prophecy. To another, discerning of spirits” it’s a lower case S, discerning of evil spirits especially, “To another, diverse or various kinds of tongues, and another, interpretations of tongues.”

God’s Spirit can manifest in us very different of these gifts. And that’s what it was doing in that early New Testament Church. They were seeing amazing things. You had people prophesying, but remember, they were filled with God’s Spirit on Pentecost. How many were there that experienced that and were able to go out and do things that, to us, seems incredibly supernatural?

But I would dare say every single one of you in the audience, me standing up here, are experiencing something far more amazing in our lives. Having, forgive the term, a manifestation trick, wind, fire, those physical things, that’s incredible. It’s the power of God. I’m not meaning to diminish it, but that’s nothing compared to you and I changing who we are to be like Jesus Christ.

And today pictures the culmination of our life’s work, or you could say God the Father in Christ’s eternal work, to move mankind and expand the family of God, but he does it by his Spirit. It gives power. Acts chapter four. Again, we’re still just looking at the New Testament. We’ll see when this modernizes in a moment. One more passage here before we start to shift gears. Acts chapter four verse twenty-eight.

Four, twenty-eight. Twenty-eight reads, “For to do whatsoever your hand and your counsel determined before to be done.” So think about it, and then apply it and do it. “And now, Lord, behold their threatenings and grant unto your servants that, with all boldness that they may speak by stretching forth your hand to heal, and that signs and wonders may be done by the name of the Holy Child Jesus.”

So by the power of God that we can do signs and wonders. And that is how the New Testament Church started. That is how everything came out of the gate, coming off this day. Pentecost is sometimes easy to dismiss, isn’t it? There’s so much weight to be given to the Passover. Preparation, we’re thinking about Christ’s sacrifice. It’s a huge time of year that we tend to think about it in advance, way more than perhaps any other time of year because we’re doing our self-preparation, being ready to take the Passover.

We don’t take it unworthily. This was a big focus in the spring. And then you do this because everyone does. I do the same thing. You think, okay, the Spring Holy Days are over. The next Holy Days in our mind are the Feast of Tabernacles. We forgot Atonement. We forgot Pentecost, but we think the Feast because there’s a lot of prep work that goes into the Feast, booking hotel rooms, registering.

There’s so much stuff that goes along with the Feast; our minds tend to jump toward that. And the Feast has Atonement pulled into it, doesn’t it? That’s all seemingly part of it. Just like in the spring, the Days of Unleavened Bread are part of taking the Passover and the days of the Passover, of course. But then it causes us mostly to not put a lot of thought into the day Christ or God established Israel and His New Testament Church, and the day that pictures a time when the kingdom of God arrives.

You could, in some ways, say Pentecost is the top of the hill, not lower down in the valley of the holy day picture. This is what God has been working for eternity. What today pictures, those to be able to go first, to start his kingdom.

Let’s go to Ephesians chapter four. So let’s jump ahead in time. What we need to be, what we’re trying to accomplish, what we want to picture and bring forward from 31 AD. Ephesians chapter four, verse one. Verse one reads, “The prisoner of the Lord beseech you that you walk worthy of the vocation wherewith you’re called,” the job, what we have, this way of life is a lot more than a job, but boy, it’s a lot more than what most see Christianity, don’t they?

Most see Christianity as Sunday, boom, done. They go there Sunday, they do their little thing for an hour or two, and they go back to living their lives and doing whatever they want. They put it lower than a vocation. They spend more time at their job than they spend at what’s supposed to be the way of life to live. Now we see it very differently. It’s a vocation which we’re called as our way of life. Verse two, “And with all loneliness and meekness and long suffering and forbearing one another in love, endeavoring to keep the unity of the spirit.” Endeavoring to keep it because it’s not easy to do. It’s not easy to stay everyone exactly the same. You won’t find anyone who walks like we walk, who thinks like we think. Look at the splinters.

I have a window into the Splinters and be able to see... You can pretty much believe whatever you want to believe as long as you’re not too vocal about the things you believe, so you don’t cause trouble. But you can have your little pet doctrine here or your little thought here, or your little Bible study here, or your little paper there.

As long as you’re not too vocal about it but that’s not the way in God’s Church.

Unity of the spirit. We have to keep it. We have to work at it. We have to maintain it in the bond of peace, because if two people disagree, they can’t walk together and therefore you don’t have peace. Verse four, “There is one body, one spirit, even as you’re called in one hope of your calling.” The unity of the body by itself shows why God works through one Church.

You can’t have multiple organizations teaching even slightly different things. From the world’s perspective, they could look at us and the splinters and say, “Oh, they teach about the same thing, so why can’t they be all together?” You could have folks in the splinters even thinking the same thing. We all teach about the same thing, why can’t we be all together?

Because they don’t all teach the same thing. God doesn’t say, “Well, you have a five percent or ten percent margin of error swing. So when I’m working out my truth, my sample size was only about five hundred people. I’ve now had to calculate into my margin of error for truth about five percent to ten percent. If we keep the core stuff right, everything else is good to go.”

No, that’s not how God looks at truth. They have to be, and we have to be endeavoring and working to keep unified. John Chapter seventeen. When we’re unified, we share a purpose. And when we share the same purpose, we tend not to lose track of what keeps us unified. John again, chapter seventeen, verse twenty-one, seventeen, twenty-one, “That they all,” all every single one, pause, “May be one.”

So not just some, not mostly all be one. God does not flavor words when it comes to unity, give any margin of error or fudge the words. It’s one. “As you father are in me and I in you,” just like God the Father in Christ, they’re made of the same stuff. How much more one can you get to be made of the same substance? They’re both made of the Holy Spirit. How much more one can you get?

Can you imagine? It’s sometimes fun to just stop and speculate what it means to be made of the same material that’s interconnected. It’d be kind of like, if you and I, if we were all made of air, how does that work? How does one person start and one person stop? Where do thoughts start and where do thoughts stop? Does God share all of his thoughts with Christ? They’re unified. They’re one.

Imagine living like that as human beings, as you think, “Oh, that’s terrifying.” There are some things that I want other people to be knowing going on in my mind, but as God, we have to be one. That’s why we continue to become more and more like Him so we can control our thoughts, we can control our actions, and we can become more one.

Continuing on, “Being one in us and the world that may believe that you have sent me,” verse twenty-two, “And the glory which you gave me, I have given them that they may be one even as we are one.” That was one of Christ’s final prayers. And you look at that, of all the different things he could have focused on when he knew there were going to be thousands of years ahead of him to watch and wait for his Church to increase and decrease for years to come and years to go.

The thing he focused on, if you take that whole chapter seventeen and really just read the whole thing, doesn’t really change the message or the meaning or the context or the main point. He focused on unity. He focused on everyone being one. Brethren, if you are not one with a brother or sister, fix it. That fix can be a lot of different ways. Matthew eighteen comes to mind. It’s a big one.

But fix it because to be part of the Church of God, to be part of those who get to be there to fulfill the day of Pentecost, we have to be one with each other, not just with God because if we’re one with God, that means those who are trying to be one with God, we’re one with them too. If you have a grudge, or a problem, or something, or an offense, fix it. Correct it. Work it out. You get to be with the people around you for eternity. We get to rule nations.

If we get into an argument on something petty, when this day pictures us over the universe, fix it. Keep the big picture in mind because to be part of this, we have to be one, we have to be unified. We have to work together, have the same purpose. Let’s go to Philippians. But it’s not just teachings, it’s not just understanding or truth. We have to do things. It’s not academic.

Christianity is academically fascinating, but you can go to seminary school to be academically fascinating. No, no, true Christianity is very different. Philippians chapter two, catch up to you there. Again, this day is picturing again, over and over that connection to God’s spirit, the day it was given and the manifestation of it on that first Pentecost when they left Egypt and the one from a couple thousand years ago.

Verse twelve of Philippians two, “Wherefore my beloved, as you have always obeyed, not in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and with trembling.” When the cat’s away, the mice will play the saying goes, that should not be the case with us. We shouldn’t need to have a minister around for us to say, “No, that’s not what God would have me do.”

Verse thirteen, “For it is God, which works in you both to will and to do his good pleasure.” That is an amazing verse. You ever feel a little discouraged sometimes? You just don’t have the oomph to do certain things, to be able to make the right decision. You know I should fellowship or I should serve, or I should do more Bible study or whatever that should is, God says, “Not only can I tell you what to do and give you the energy to go do the thing that you should do, I can give you the will to want to do it.

If we’re ever feeling a little discouraged or a little, “I’m tired,” because we all could feel it. It happens. It’s life. We’re human beings. We get tired. We can ask God to give us the will to do more. Put it in us and then you can follow that right up with, “Okay, now I’ve got the will. You’re right, God, I’ve just been thinking this through into my prayer. I need to serve more. I need to go out and do help. Give me the energy because I’m tired.” He can give you both to will and to do, it’s two steps.

One, will, second, to do. Let’s go to Colossians chapter three. We’ll build up these five steps. We all sometimes get that feeling of I don’t want to. I don’t want to. That is a verboten saying in our household, but I don’t want to. Well, I don’t care. So you’re going to do more now. So when you want to, you get to do less. We’re just teaching them to learn to will and then to do.

Colossians chapter three and verse sixteen. Verse sixteen reads, “Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom, teaching and admonishing one another in psalms, and hymns, and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord.” We did that today. We do it every service. “...And whatsoever you do in word or deed,” we’re starting to expand what that do means, “...whatsoever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God and the Father by him.” So we have to will: we have to do, number two. Number three… you can number these if you want, it’s how I tend to remember them.

Number three, we have word and deeds. You could say words and actions. So God give me the will to go do, and then once I go do, that comes out as words and actions. And then when I do it, I should hit number four, give thanks to God and the Father by him. So will, giving the energy to do. When I go do, that’s words and action, so God make sure those are correct, and then thank God for it. And then it leads to something that comes as a result of that because that’s a repeatable process, will, do, words and actions, thanking God. Will, do, words and actions, thanking God. That you repeat that over and over.

We do it hundreds of times in our day. Sometimes the will may be there, so it’s not as hard for us to do. Or you may be the morning you feel great, you’re ready to go do a whole bunch of stuff, and we say or do the wrong thing, then we need God’s help there. And then when we will, do, and do the words and actions, we thank God that He gave us the ability to do that by His spirit.

Let’s go to Micah six. Micah chapter six. This is our goal in our life. It ties right back to unity. Micah chapter six verse seven, “Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams…” sacrifices, “…or with tens of thousands of rivers of oil? Shall I give my firstborn for my transgressions, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?” Will I kill thousands of bullocks? Will I do all of these physical things?

Is that how I get on the good side of God, if you will. Verse eight, “He has shown me, O man, what is good.” Well, he’s going to answer the question. “...and what does the Lord require of you but to do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with God?” It says, “…humbly with your God.”

Ultimately, if we do those four steps, the fifth one becomes walking with God. And then we repeat, and we repeat, and we repeat. And if we all do that, the automatic byproduct is unity. We all become one because we’re all trying to be more like God… I mean more like Christ and the byproduct of that is we’re, again, if we’re more like him and one with him, the more one we’re with each other. Simple as that.

God wants to help us. That’s why He wants to walk with us. It doesn’t say so you walk like your God, or do the things like your God, of course, we do that, but God says, “No, I want to walk with you.” Because, of course, He does. You think if you’re walking with someone, and we’re human, God is God. So sometimes it’s easier to picture ourselves in a similar equation. So, we’re this, like, broken down, ninety-eight-year-old, back broke, one-legged war vet.

The picture, someone who’s really gone through a few things in life and they have a walker or whatever they’re doing. They’re barely getting their steps to move forward, and then you have God who’s God and spry walking next to you, and He’s not walking with us because He wants to laugh, “Well, you really don’t get around very well anymore.” No. He’s there to help us. So we get to walk with Him.

He props us up. He lifts us up. Remember, to will, to do, words and actions, and then we thank Him for it. That’s why He walks with us, not because of any other means. Why would He even… why would He spend the time? He’s God. But He wants to do things that can help us. Matthew chapter five. And we’ll take away the picture of the ninety-eight-year-old war vets.

If there is any ninety-eight-year war vets with one leg and a broken back, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to offend you, but we want to picture that. But what happens is, if we keep doing it. We keep exhibiting that same behavior, we start looking more like our Creator, this begins to happen. Matthew chapter five verse fourteen. We’ll start. Verse fourteen of Matthew five, “You are the light of the world, a city that is set on a hill that cannot be hid.” As the world grows darker, we go brighter.

Even if we don’t get brighter, we look brighter. If you ever see a flashlight and you turn a flashlight on in a dark room or you flick the light switch on in a dark room, there’s a second you’re blind. I have light color eyes, green eyes, and my nemesis is the sun. So if I walk outside and it’s in a shadow and I walk and I hit the sunlight, it’s just like kryptonite, I’m starting to wither, the old witch that got water poured, I’m like, “No.”

But eventually, my eyes adjust and I can handle it to the same sun that didn’t change its brightness. If your brightness doesn’t change but everywhere around you has gotten darker, you stand out more. Verse fifteen, “Neither do men light a candle and put it under a bushel, but on a candlestick, and it gives light unto all that are in the house.” Verse sixteen, “So let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works…” your will, your do, your deeds, your words, “…and glorify your Father which is in heaven.”

As we become more like Christ, as we let God’s spirit change us, all we’re doing is being an example. We are being the manifestation of the spirit, if you will, to all of those people around us. They don’t understand Christianity, they don’t understand the truths of God, but they do understand you interacting with them. Me. When we’re polite, when we’re kind, when we just go to them and say, “Thank you,” hold the door open, offer to help someone.

There’s been times where, over at Giant Eagle, situations where I offer to take someone’s cart because you’re going inside, you need a cart. It’s perfectly logical. It’s not even. It’s a little self-serving. I don’t have to go to the other line, it’s just right in front of me, I’m being lazy. And the look on their face of like, “Oh, thank you.” That shouldn’t get that reaction.

But we live in a world that keeps getting darker, and would rather leave the cart in between two cars so a cart gets damaged than take it to the front, never mind someone offered to do it for them. That’s tiny. But if we’re polite in any situation, we stand out. Our light shows, we are different, and we’re exhibiting what God is trying to do through His spirit, and ultimately what it becomes when this day is fulfilled.

But it takes that spirit to change us. God’s spirit is required to go from where we were to where we can become. And if you’re not baptized yet, don’t count yourself out. You move towards baptism. Go through the steps. Don’t delay baptism. If you’ve been attending in God’s way for any length of time, that should be on your mind because there is a limitation with what God will do when the spirit’s working with you because He’s expecting you to move to the next step.

God can do that for years, if you’re younger. But you reach a certain age or if you’ve been attending for a while, the next step in God’s way is being baptized because the spirit needs to be in you. It can work with you for a time, but we need it to be in us to change us. That’s why before baptism, most of what you or I changed are physical. We stopped eating pork. We kept the Sabbath.

We didn’t do the things that were physical things. But I heard said years ago, and it’s a powerful statement, one of the things you can never do when you are not baptized is you can’t put wrong thoughts out of your mind because God’s spirit’s working with you, outside and around you, not directly working with your mind, so you cannot put out wrong thoughts.

Once you’re baptized, that changes. So that’s the direction you need that spirit to change. Go to Second Corinthians chapter three. Second Corinthians chapter three and verse seventeen. Verse seventeen of Second Corinthians three reads… I’ll let you get there. I still have pages there.

Verse seventeen of two Corinthians chapter three, “Now the Lord is that spirit…” You look in the context talking about God and the Father. This is one of those very simple but subtle trinity disproves. You can disprove the trinity with this verse. If Bob, Joe, and Jill are all standing together, no one can come up and say, “Bob is Joe.” Or, “Bob is Jill.” Now they’re all three separate entities. Even if they’re conjoined twins, they could all be joined at the hip. They’re conjoined twins, but there’s Bob, Joe, and Jill. You can’t become the other person.

Verse seventeen reads, it says, “Now the Lord is that spirit.” Because He’s made up of it. The Holy Spirit, it’s not a separate entity. We know that. There’s another one of those things that we as Christians, in God’s way of life, it’s second nature to us. It never crosses your mind. You never think, “Maybe. You know what, maybe the Holy Spirit does have a personality.”

We never do, but when people see that for the first time or hear it for the first time about the Trinity, that’s earth-shattering to them, and things we probably just take for granted. Continue on and, “...The Lord is spirit, is that spirit, and where the spirit of the Lord is there is liberty. But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass,” or looking in a mirror, “...the glory of the Lord are changed into the same image from glory to glory,” receiving and having with our mind and then later and born into the family of God, “...even as by the spirit of the Lord.”

Change happens by the spirit of the Lord.

That’s what the verse says. God’s spirit empowers us to become different people, not who we were before. Romans chapter eight. So many people lose what is a basic aspect of what it means to live God’s way of life is to change. It’s a social club in most Churches of the world. That’s what they do. A social club. People want to do the right thing. There are people out there that try to, yes. I’m not saying, “O everyone out there is bad,” but most miss the picture of why we do this way of life to change, to grow, to repent, develop.

Romans chapter eight verse seven reads, “Because the carnal mind is enmity or enemy of God, for it’s not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be.” Human mind cannot understand spiritual things. Even with the spirit of man. We can build and create the most amazing of things. I watched this week, I think it was this week, maybe it was earlier in this week, watched a spaceship that is four hundred feet tall, so longer than a baseball field, that had thirty-three rockets in it, shoot what was essentially a baseball field, up into outer space.

That bottom thruster, the booster, flew itself back to earth, landed, all on its own, and then this Starship went through, flew for a while, came back through the atmosphere, and then landed itself as well. They landed in the ocean, so they didn’t recover them, but they were testing it. Mankind can create some pretty amazing things. It wasn’t that long ago that you would’ve been amazed with something going into space.

It been years since we really had the capability and the United States to do it. Now it’s become so normal that you don’t even announce rocket launches every couple of days. Because man can create amazing things, amazing physical things.

Remember the verse that reads, “Not subject to the law of God and neither can be. So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God.” If you can’t understand what to do, understand how to obey God, or understand spiritual things, how do you please them? You can’t. “You are not in the flesh but in the spirit,” that be the spirit of God dwells in you again, and you are with you if not yet baptized. “Now, if any man have not the spirit of Christ, he’s none of his.”

The key differentiator. You are not a Christian without the spirit of Christ. “If Christ be in you, and the body is dead because of sin, but the spirit of life because of righteousness.”

Verse eleven. “But if the spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwells in you, and he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his spirit that dwells in you.” That’s the change we’re all shooting for. That’s our goal. That’s our focus. That’s what we want to get to at the end. The change from physical to spirit. That doesn’t happen overnight.

That doesn’t happen... Just does happen the twinkling of an eye, it’s instant, the change, but to qualify for that change takes time. Takes effort, takes that same spirit at baptism to go into our mind, starting to change our mind, take our stony heart, make it into flesh. Started making it so it could be molded and shaped and changed to allow us to be ready for that moment. That moment that this day pictures for us to be able to go to spirit, become spirit.

Let’s go back to Psalm chapter fifty-one. We need to change now. If we want to be able to become spirit, then we need to change now. Verse seven of Psalm fifty-one, “Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean. Wash me, and I’ll be wider than snow. Make me to hear joy and gladness, that the bones which you have broken may rejoice. Hide your face from my sins, and blot out all my iniquities. Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit in me.” Because there can be a wrong spirit in me or you.

We need a clean heart created because we didn’t start that way. We need a right spirit in us. In this case, he’s asking for it to renew it, strengthen it over and over again. Continue to change. As David describes here, he needs it renewed so do you and I. Our heart, just like anything pure, if you think of those facilities, clean rooms, where they make silicone chips for computers. Super clean rooms.

They’re careful of filtering the air. Not anything that gets in there brings impurities into that facility that could damage and cost millions and millions of dollars. All it takes is a speck. Little bits and pieces to change, to corrupt, to make that heart, in our case, wrong decisions, wrong conduct. To make our clean heart, that God gave us at baptism, that fleshy heart to start to bring elements of, I guess you could say, of the stones back. If you look at an oyster, you get a pearl.

That pearl started out because that clam or that oyster got a speck in it. And that little bit of stone got into that animal and that animal tried to coat that to get it away from them, and eventually becomes an oyster. It’s worth a lot of money now, but it started as a spec. It started as something that made it would’ve been unclean. A rock like that can get back into our heart so we’re going to be renewed daily.

Verse eleven, “Cast me not away from your presence, and take not your Holy Spirit from me.” Because without that spirit, we can’t have our hearts renewed. We can’t have our heart be clean. Ezekiel thirty-six, I’ve reference this, but we can read it. Ezekiel chapter thirty-six verse twenty-four, pick up.

Verse twenty-four of Ezekiel thirty-six. “For I take you from among the heathen, and gather you out of all countries, and will bring you into your own land. Then I will sprinkle you clean, I’ll sprinkle clean water upon you, and you shall be clean, from all your filthiness and from all your idols, I will cleanse you.” Sounds familiar, cleanse me, renew me, create a clean heart.

Verse twenty-six, “A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit I’ll put in you, and I will take away the stony heart of your flesh, and I will give you a heart of flesh.” I gave a whole sermon on stony versus fleshy hearts. But God says the thing he’s going for. This is an amazing.

So all of what we do, we fight our flesh, we don’t want to be like our flesh our flesh is a problem, but in this one instance, God said, “Flesh is a step up from where your heart currently is.” Your heart’s down. If we get it to flesh, we’re doing pretty well. It takes conversion to get it to flesh, ultimately the goal to become spirit but all other aspects when you hear about flesh, it’s definitely in a negative. We have to fight the flesh, war of the flesh, etcetera. But when it comes to the heart God says, “A fleshy heart’s better than the stony heart you have. I will give you a heart of flesh.” “And I will put my spirit in you and cause you to walk in my statutes and you shall keep my judgments and do them.”

That requires us to change. That requires God’s spirit to change our hearts. It’s God doing it through His spirit. His spirit is the tool. That’s why people get confused when they read the Bible and things like the Trinity because they see the spirit doing things. Not just, if I go to work on a car, the wrench is going to loosen the bolt, but the wrench didn’t do it on its own.

There was a person behind holding the wrench, moving it. The Holy Spirit is the wrench. It’s the tool. But God requires us to be able to have that in us to start to change. It allows us to become more and more like Christ, like God, be able to be again, unified in all the things we saw that happened in the New Testament or in the first century, that we then have to emulate and do today.

But it does more of that spirit, First Corinthians chapter two. God can guide us through that spirit. Remember to will, to do, what to say, that all applies, but we can get guidance. We can receive wisdom by His spirit. This is not the throwaway Holy Day that it’s easy to put it in. I know no one says, “Ah, I can toss out Pentecost. It’s not a big deal.”

No, we don’t think like that, but we do, I think, very easily put it kind of on the back burner in our mind.

It’s when we do. We give an offering, but God puts an incredible amount of weight behind this day, both what he did historically and how it’s going to be fulfilled in the near future. Chapter two and verse ten, “But God has revealed unto us by his spirit, for the spirit searches all things, yes, the deep things of God,” because remember, without that spirit, we can’t understand the things of God.

Verse eleven, “For what man knows the things of a man, save the spirit of man, which is in him.” Without the spirited man, there are not rocket ships. There is not electricity. There are not the chairs, everything we have. We are animals. No different. We might as well be Boggart or Hank in a pen out there. Someone’s taking care of us. We’re just walking around. Everything is just happening in front of us.

We don’t have the ability to be able to move information from one generation to another. That’s the spirited man that allows that. Save the spirited man, which is in him. “Even so, the things of God knows no man, but because it’s by the spirit of God.” We can’t understand God without his spirit. Just like we couldn’t understand electricity without the human spirit. The ability to record, but we can’t record spiritual knowledge. You can hear it. You can hear spiritual knowledge.

I could pick up the book. I could be as unconverted. I could be an atheist or a devil worshiper, whoever it is, and pick up the word of God and read words and say those words make sense, or part of those words make sense, but I have no ability to retain that spiritual knowledge. You can teach a horse how to count, but the horse is not going to do algebra; has no ability to go beyond the simple. We need God’s spirit to unlock that, to be able to go further.

Galatians five. Just a simple one here. A few quick verses. Galatians chapter five, verse twenty-five. It says it very concisely here. Verse twenty-five of Galatians five reads. “If we live in the spirit, let us also walk in the spirit.” If we want to exemplify this way of life, we have to walk this way of life. We have to do. We have to be that light in everything that we do. Everyone we interface with.

It allows us to live, but again, it requires action. Let’s go back to Proverbs chapter three. Again, just a few quick verses here. Proverbs chapter three and verse five. Three, five. Verse five reads, “Trust in the Lord with all your heart,” all of it, “...and lean not into your own understanding.” We’re differentiating the two. “In all of your ways acknowledge Him,” all of them.

And if you do, if you trust with your whole heart, we don’t lean into our own understanding, in all of our ways we acknowledge him, “...then he shall direct your paths.” Again, remember we’ll do words and deeds, thanking God so you can walk with him. But he’ll guide our path if we don’t lean onto our understanding.

So verse seven again, continues, “Be not wise in your own eyes.” Don’t think highly of yourself. And it’s a harder... If you have a skill, if someone has a skill, it’s easy for us especially in that specific area, to be wise and all of that. We know our way. Something I do for myself is I’m comfortable with computers. I know my way around them pretty well.

I can look at that and think I am good with computers. If you all could just keep up with me, then I’ll show you a thing or two, or I could remember, apply this in your life or whatever area you have your skills in, that God gives us our skills and our talents and the various other things. So as soon as I start to think, “Wow, I’m really good at this.” I have to remember, “Well, I’m only good at whatever God allowed me to be good at, or whatever experiences you open my life to, to be able to have training in those areas.”

And then you quickly as a human being, start to deflate. Realizing, “Okay, I’m who I am because of the creator who let me experience and do the things and put the DNA together to be able to understand the things that I do, that he then thought about before the foundation of the world.” At which point you feel very much smaller because he’s been planning this for a long time and knew who he needed when he needed them. But be not wise in your own eyes.

Fear the Lord, which will cause you to depart from evil because we fear mistakes. You don’t want the mistakes that cause you to fight God, which means you have to lean on God. And when we lean on God, we give his understanding. He directs our paths. And when God is directing our paths, what are we not going to do? We’re not going to do things that are evil, so we will depart from evil. It’s always the formula God has that you follow a series of steps and the result is almost a default if we follow those previous steps.

Let’s go back to the New Testament, John sixteen. John chapter sixteen verse twelve. Verse twelve of John sixteen. “I have yet many things to say unto you, but you cannot bear.” It means endure them now. So this is like when we’re first baptized, God doesn’t show us all the things that we need to change in our lives, or as you’ll hear in a baptismal counseling session.

If he showed you everything all at once, you just climb to the highest house or building or tree or a bridge and just jump off because you know, you can’t change all those things. It’s impossible. Now, God, Christ is saying there’s a lot of things here that you’re going to learn, but your mind’s not really ready for them yet because they didn’t have his spirit yet.

So even those deeper things, they couldn’t quite understand. They could hear them. The spirit was working with them, but not yet in them. “Howbeit when he, the spirit of truth, has come, he will guide you into all truth, or he shall not speak of himself, but whatsoever he shall hear and he shall speak,” of course, this is the Father talking through the Spirit or Christ, “...and he will show those things which shall come.”

God’s spirit acts as a database, if you will, of spiritual matters in our mind. We suddenly now have access to information that we didn’t have access before. The ability to store and sort and categorize spiritual information that we couldn’t do before. You can’t build a house without blueprints. We can’t develop and change as Christians without God’s spirit giving us access to the blueprints, if you will, of how to live this way of life. God’s spirit gives us understanding. That’s what this day is about, the power of our creator as He works with mankind, Ancient Israel, Thirty-one AD, and you and I today.

Go to James chapter one. We start to wrap up. James chapter one, verse five, just one verse here. James one, five. This should be an easy question to answer. “If any of you lack wisdom,” we can all put our hands up and be, “Yes, we sure do.” All of us do, because we’re not God. So there’s wisdom we can attain if we start at the starting point of saying we lack wisdom. Even if we have it, there’s more we can take or ask for, receive. “...let Him ask of God, that gives to all men liberally.” He’s happy to give us more wisdom “...and upbraideth not, and it shall be given unto him.”

Again, it’s through that connection. God’s spirit allows us to pray to Him, come before the judgment seat of God, and be able to come before his throne. That we received. That’s pictured on this day. I will never forget Pentecost, because I was actually baptized on Pentecost. It just happened to work out the timing of the year. So it’s always in my mind.

I actually don’t remember the day I was baptized, but I remember the day of Pentecost, so I know what day it was. And then Pentecost is a tricky one because you always have to go look it up. I should just memorize it at some point. But since it’s a count, that means it’s not the same Hebrew date or the same Gregorian calendar date. So I have no idea what the date of my baptism was. I just know the year, and it was on Pentecost. So it stays in my mind.

It has nothing to do with the sermon, but it keeps Pentecost in my mind. But God says, if you want wisdom, we just have to ask, and he’ll give it. He doesn’t hold it back. He’s not stingy with wisdom. And we all lack what we would need. And ultimately, this picture, the old first-century Church, what we can glean from it, how the Spirit works through us, what it changes in us, what we become from it. The goal is to lead us to become more like Jesus Christ.

Romans chapter twelve. Romans chapter twelve. We’ll start in verse one, beginning of the book. Twelve, one. “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service.” This is the baseline of what we have to do. We have to be those who sacrifice ourselves.

Verse two, “And be not conformed,” this is an interesting word, but we’ll read and come back. “...be not conformed to this world, but be you transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is the good, acceptable, and perfect, will of God.” We want to do the things that are God’s will, both prove it, know it’s good, what’s acceptable and perfect. But the meaning of that verse is conformed versus transformed.

So conformed, the meaning of it is take the shape of. So if I’m conforming around a glass, I take Play-Doh, for instance, and you put around a glass, it’ll conform to that shape. And then if you heat it up, you could be hard and it’ll stay that shape. It’s effectively taken on that shape. So God’s saying, don’t let what I’ve done through you because you’re different now. You’ve buried that old man.

Don’t be the Play-Doh that takes the shape of the world again. Don’t let that happen. No, no, you’re going through a different process, and it continues to be you transformed by the renewing of our minds. So transformation, that’s what it means. A metamorphosis. So we are changing beyond what we currently are. We can’t go back, we can’t go back and be conform, but we have to keep being transformed. We do that, and we better understand the perfect will of God and what we need to do in our lives.

Galatians chapter three. A couple more verses here, passages. Galatians chapter three, verse twenty-six. Galatians chapter three and verse twenty-six. Verse twenty-six reads, “For you are all the children of God, by faith in Christ Jesus. For as many as you have been baptized into Christ, have put on Christ.” Even if we’re not fully there yet, brethren, we’ve got to put them on.

You know the saying being put on you’re kind of faking it. Christianity, in some ways, is a fake it till you make it sort of game to walk that we have to live. Even if we don’t know how to do all the things, yet, we try to, we observe, and become over time. Remember, if we do, we will, we do. We walk all those steps. We become more and more like Christ, and we become less of a put-on of Christ.

We become more like Him. Because if you put on Christ, “There’s neither a Jew nor Greek nor bond nor free male or female, for we are all one in Jesus Christ.” Because that’s the goal. To be one. To be like Him means we’re like the Father, to be like the Father. We’re like Christ. And if we all do that, then each of us are like each other. And the verse continues and finishes with in verse twenty-nine, “...that will be heirs according to the promise.” Finally, Philippians chapter one. Philippians chapter one.

Start in verse three. Verse three of Philippians one. “I thank my God upon every remembrance of you. Always in every prayer of mine for you all, making requests with joy, for your fellowship in the gospel from the first day until now.” What is the first day in their mind? Can you imagine what it is? The apostles, they were there when that Holy Spirit was given, when they saw the tongues of fire, when they... What would’ve been in their mind the first day until now? Pentecost, of course. “Being confident of this very thing...”

So we’ve seen the First Century Church on the day of Pentecost. What we need to do today, all the steps that we need to run through, the procedures to develop and grow and become like Christ. We know we have to will, we receive that will from God, to do, to change our words, our deeds, thank Him. Verse six, “Being confident of this very thing that he, which began a good work in you and me, He’ll perform it until the day of Christ.” Brethren, this day will be fulfilled.

We didn’t get to experience what they experienced in Thirty-one AD. It was quieter. We didn’t have fire. You don’t understand my French. Neither could the French. But what we did have was the same spirit. That same spirit that has demonstrated that power two thousand years ago is in us today, is changing us, is helping us grow. If we take all that we’ve learned both this afternoon and this morning, and apply it tonight after the sun goes down and let God’s spirit continue to work at us.

It’s not a one-day event, and continue to grow to change us daily. Continue to be more like Jesus Christ, every single day God gives us. If we do, we’ll be ready. We’ll be ready to be there when this day is fulfilled and when the spirit that’s helping us change now, we’ll be there and be part of when that spirit changes us to be part of the family of God.