When Did It Begin
Acts 2

Intro:
Good morning.
A woman had just returned to her home from an evening of bible class, when she was startled by an intruder. She caught the man in the act of robbing her home of its valuables and yelled: “Stop! Acts 2:38!”
The burglar froze in his tracks. The woman calmly called the police and explained what she had done.
As the officer cuffed the man to take him in, he asked the burglar: “Why did you just stand there? All the old lady did was yell a scripture to you.”
”Scripture?” replied the burglar. “She said she had an Ax and two 38's!”
I guess the point there is that misunderstanding can lead to inaction.

I. The question I want to bring to you today is: When did it begin? Let me rephrase it, when is the birthday of the church, the kingdom? I know what you’re going to say because you’ve read Acts chapter two. I suppose it’s one of the most familiar passages among churches of Christ, at any rate. Since you’ve read that chapter, you will say that the church began on the day of Pentecost. It seems pretty obvious. It may be obvious to you, but it may surprise you to know that not everybody agrees on this being the beginning of the church.
A. For example, there are some people that believe that the church began in the far off days of Abraham when God commanded Abraham to introduce the rite of circumcision which became the mark of a Jew. By means of that particular ceremony a male child, when he was very young, was brought into the covenant of Israel.
B. They want to tell us, just as circumcision was the sign of a Jew in Old Testament, that when a little baby is taken at a few days old and water is sprinkled or poured upon its head and it is “christened” that this is really the New Testament counterpart of circumcision in the Old Testament. Just as that rite of circumcision made a person a Jew, so sprinkling, the christening, brought the child into the New Testament relationship with Christ, and made them a Christian. (By the way the word christen came in use around 1200 from the Old English word “cristnian” which literally meant to make a Christian.) *See Colossians 2:11-13 for the argument basis of infant baptism.
1. By means of water sprinkled on its head a child becomes, and I quote a bit from the prayer book of people who practice this, “a child of God, a member of Christ and an inheritor of the Kingdom of Heaven. This child coming into Thy holy baptism may receive the remission of his sins by spiritual regeneration.” You see what is being said there? It’s saying that this rite, the ceremony of sprinkling, is what produces a Christian.
2. Consequently they say that this is the New Testament counterpart of the ceremony that made a Jew. Logical right? Now I’d like to read from the prophet Jeremiah in; Jeremiah 31:31-34 – “Behold, the days are coming,'' says the Lord, "when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah now listen "not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, My covenant which they broke, though I was a husband to them,'' says the Lord. "But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel: After those days, says the Lord, I will put My law in their minds, and write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. "No more shall every man teach his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, 'Know the Lord,' for they all shall know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them,'' says the Lord. "For I will forgive their iniquity, and their sin I will remember no more.” [NKJ]
3. God said when He made the new covenant; it wouldn’t be like the one He made with their fathers in the wilderness. It would an entirely new covenant. You see, a male child was taken, at a few days old, into a ceremony and brought into a covenant relationship with God under the Law of Moses and then was taught to know the Lord. He had to learn what it meant to be Jew, what it meant to be under the Mosaic covenant.
4. According to Jeremiah 31:33-34 - “But this shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel; After those days, saith the Lord, I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts; and will be their God, and they shall be my people. And they shall teach no more every man his neighbour, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord: for they shall all know me, from the least of them unto the greatest of them, saith the Lord: for I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.” All those in the new covenant would not need to be taught to know the Lord because they would enter that covenant on the basis of a personal faith in God. In other words, they will be believers as they enter the covenant.
II. Let’s think about this for a short time, shall we? That new covenant is important to us if we want to know when the church began.
A. Let me remind you of what happened in the upper room according to Matthew 26. In the upper room, Jesus met for the last time with His disciples to celebrate the Passover. It’s often called the “Last Supper”. On that occasion, you remember, Jesus instituted the feast that we have celebrated this morning, the “Lord’s Supper”.
B. At that feast, in verse 28, Jesus said; “For this is my blood of the new testament, which is shed for many for the remission of sins.” That’s the new covenant that we’re talking about. Jesus is saying that the shedding of His blood ratified the new covenant under which the church was to be created.
C. In I Corinthians 11:23 – for example, the apostle Paul says; “For I have received of the Lord that which also I delivered unto you, That the Lord Jesus the same night in which he was betrayed took bread:” Then Paul goes on to describe the institution of the Lord’s Supper. Here’s something that may surprise you. When we read I Corinthians chapter 11 scholars tell us we are reading the first recorded institution of the Lord’s Supper because I Corinthians predates Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. Paul puts on record what happened in that upper room. He wrote that Jesus said; “This cup is the new testament in my blood”. Verse 25
1. Then, you remember, that wonderful passage in the Hebrew letter. Hebrews 9:16-17 – “For where there is a testament, there must also of necessity be the death of the testator. For a testament is in force after men are dead, since it has no power at all while the testator lives.” [NKJ] Here the writer says where there is a will, or a covenant, there must first be the death of the one who makes the will because a will, or a covenant, or a testament is not in force until the one who makes it dies.
2. What does this mean? The simple truth is this, any church that began in the distant days of Abraham or in the days of John the Baptist, for that matter, could not be the church that you read about in the New Testament. The church that you read about in the New Testament had to come into existence after the ratification of the new covenant. That covenant was only ratified, only made valid when Jesus shed His blood on the cross.
III. Jesus said upon this rock I will build My church. That simply means that it was after the resurrection of Jesus from the dead, when Jesus had instructed His disciples to tarry in Jerusalem until “you are endued, or receive power from on high”. Then the church was established.
A. Of course, Acts 2 tells us exactly how it happened. It was a great event, wasn’t it? It is one of the greatest events in human history because it was the day when the church began. That chapter tells us about the coming of the Holy Spirit. It tells of the evidence of the presence of the Holy Spirit, the first preaching of the Gospel, the first obedience to the faith, the first fellowship of the early church.
B. The true church is the church which began at the right place,… at the right time… and under the right circumstances. When we examine Acts 2, and I really want us to think about this, this morning. I know that I’m preaching to the converted here in this matter.
C. I know that many of you are fully aware of what Acts 2 teaches, but it seems to me that we’re living at a time when it’s absolutely essential to rehearse and repeat the teaching of the New Testament on these matters. Particularly when we have young Christians, young people, who need to know what the Bible says about the beginning of the church and why it began on the day of Pentecost.
IV. The right time, the right place, and the right circumstances. You know that it begins, when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all together in one place.
A. Now, think about the place. The place was right. The prophet in Isaiah 2:2-3 - makes this prophecy; “Now it shall come to pass in the latter days that the mountain of the Lord's house shall be established on the top of the mountains, and shall be exalted above the hills; and all nations shall flow to it. Many people shall come and say, "Come, and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob; he will teach us His ways, and we shall walk in His paths.'' For out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.” The mountain of the Lord’s house, what are we talking about here?
B. You may recall that in Bible symbolism a mountain represents a kingdom. The evidence of that is Daniel 2 when explaining that wonderful image in that dream of Nebuchadnezzar at verse 34 Daniel went on to point out that there was a stone that would separate itself without hands, miraculously, and that stone would strike this image which Nebuchadnezzar had seen in his dream on the feet bringing it crashing down, grinding it to powder.
1. Then in verse 35 it says the stone itself would grow and grow until it became a great mountain and fill the whole earth. Daniel explained in verse 44 that in the days of these kings, the God of heaven shall set up a kingdom which shall not be destroyed, whose glory shall not be given to other people.
2. The mountain of the Lord’s house is the kingdom of the Lord’s house. Let me take you to what Paul says in I Timothy 3:14-15 – “These things I write to you, though I hope to come to you shortly; but if I am delayed, I write so that you may know how you ought to conduct yourself in the house of God, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and ground of the truth.” [NKJ]. The word house or oikos < oy-kos> means a household. It means a family. Paul is talking about the family of the Lord. He says the family of the Lord, the house of the Lord, the kingdom of the Lord - is the church of the living God.
C. That’s why the apostles were told to wait in Jerusalem, because the kingdom, the house, the mountain of the Lord’s house was to begin in Jerusalem. Jesus said wait in Jerusalem for the power that’s going to come upon you from on high. That’s where it began.
D. In Luke 24:47 – “And that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in his name among all nations, beginning at Jerusalem.” Jesus commanded them that repentance and forgiveness of sins should be preached in all nations beginning at Jerusalem. In that way the prophecy of the Old Testament was fulfilled. Out of Zion went forth the law of pardon and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. Jerusalem was the place where the Gospel was preached in its fullness for the very first time… fulfilling the ancient prophecy. When the apostles tarried in Jerusalem, they were waiting in the right place.
V. The day was also right. We often speak of the day of Pentecost. What does it mean? The day of Pentecost was the day that celebrated the gathering of the harvest, the first fruits of the harvest. Think about what Pentecost meant to the Jews, or perhaps I should say, what it should have meant to the Jews. What was its significance?
A. The sad truth is that there were many people living in the time of Jesus for whom the day of Pentecost perhaps didn’t mean a very great deal. They might have even considered it to be an outdated, outmoded occasion. As a point of interest, for the modern Jew, the liberal Jew of today, the day of Pentecost doesn’t mean very much either.
B. Although, the day of Pentecost is one of the three major feasts at which every Jew of 14 years of age must present himself in Jerusalem (by the way this was not an option, this was an order, this was a command, was an essential). He must go to Jerusalem three times a year—to celebrate the Feast of Tabernacle, the Feast of Pentecost and the Passover.
C. For the modern Jew this doesn’t really matter for the simple reason Shavuot , as they call it, doesn’t mean a great deal. Things have changed and have changed radically. In fact they have changed the celebration itself. Of course, as you know very well, they have no temple. They have no priesthood to offer sacrifices for them. You know the temple mount is in the hands of Arabs. The Jews hope one day to recover the temple mount and they hope to rebuild the temple there, but that’s not today.
D. It’s why they’re at the Wailing Wall all the time praying for the restoration of the temple, but that’s not today. The modern Jew has changed the tabernacle celebration into a synagogue celebration. In Exodus 34 we find Moses up on Mount Sinai receiving the replacement copy of the commandments from God and in verse 22 God tells Moses; “And thou shalt observe the feast of weeks, of the firstfruits of wheat harvest”.
VI. Think though about those Jews alive in New Testament times. They’re reminded that, oh, some 1400 years had passed since their forefathers in the wilderness had been commanded to observe the Feast of Tabernacles. Of course, in New Testament times, they still ate bread, and I supposed they still gather in the harvest, but great changes had taken place in the intervening centuries.
A. Their lifestyle had changed. For example, the Jews were once an agricultural people. They were once shepherds. After settling in the land of Canaan they had become merchants and traders. They had built cities and they had, for some time at least, been a free nation.
B. They had been a people united in the days of Solomon, but not united today. They were divided religiously. There were the Sadducees and Pharisees and the Zealots who all hated each other and other sects besides.
1. They were divided linguistically. They reverenced and respected the old Hebrew language in which the Old Testament was written, but now Aramaic was the common tongue. They also dealt in all the different languages they had learned because they had been dispersed throughout the Roman Empire. They came with different dialects and different tongues. And we read of that also in Acts 2.
2. They were divided culturally. They were not just Judeaistic Jews, that is Jews that lived in Palestine, but there were Hellenistic Jews, people who lived in different parts of the empire, who had adopted Greek and Roman customs. They simply didn’t live as their forefathers had.
C. They were called the Diaspora, the Jews of the dispersion. You can understand that many of these Jews, living in distant places in the Roman Empire, upon being told that they needed to go back to Jerusalem to celebrate the Passover there, well, they wondered what it was all about. Or being told to celebrate Pentecost or being told to celebrate the Feast of Tabernacles? Do you mean we have to travel all that way? We have to leave our homes and our families and our businesses and go back to Jerusalem to celebrate a feast that doesn’t mean a great deal to us now days?
D. Still they came because Jerusalem drew them and it still draws them. The fact remains that today Jerusalem is a divided city and they are divided as a people in many ways.
E. It is unquestionably a matter of great sadness to the Jews that they don’t have a temple in which to celebrate these feasts. They came and I say they still come because they do hope that one day their kingdom will be restored.
VII. There were people in New Testament times who knew the ancient meaning of the feast of Pentecost and they could explain it to you and they could tell you what it meant. They were the ones Luke describes as devout men in Acts 2:5. “And there were dwelling at Jerusalem, Jews, devout men, out of every nation under heaven.”
A. We know it as the feast of Pentecost. That’s how Luke describes it, but in reality that is not a name that you find in the Old Testament. That name only goes back to the Greek period.
B. The word Pentecost comes from the Greek and it indicates the 50th. It doesn’t tell you what the feast is about or what happened. It simply gives you the date. It tells you that it happened seven weeks plus one day after the celebration of the Passover.
C. The modern Jews call it the Shavuot , but they don’t even use that name very often. You won’t find that name used in much of their literature. They don’t, for example, call it the feast of harvest either. They don’t even call it the feast of the first fruits.
D. In New Testament times when the feast was being celebrated, they took some of the flour that was made from the grain of the new harvest and two new loaves were made of that flour The loaves were waved up and down and backwards and forwards by the priest. The people were not allowed to eat of the new harvest until this offering had taken place. It was called a wave offering when the first fruits were offered to the Lord.
E. This then is the significance of Pentecost — the ingathering of the first fruits of the harvest. Take the recognition of the goodness of God revealed in the harvest and apply that to the Gospel. It’s a very fitting day when the first fruits of the sacrifice of Jesus came to God, the first harvest of the Gospel. And the church was established.
VIII. What did the day of Pentecost mean to the apostles? In an immediate and personal sense it meant the fulfillment of the promise that Jesus had made to them. He’d said to them; “you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be witnesses to Me in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.” [NKJ] Acts 1:8. He assured them; “for John truly baptized with water, but you shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now.” [NKJ] Acts 1:5
A. This is what it meant to them, but in addition to the power there were other things that happened because they received the Holy Spirit on that day. They would have, for example, the Holy Spirit as the comforter.
B. This is what we’ve been talking about in John 14:16 — a comforter with strength, the [para klee tos] the one called alongside to help.
C. This would be another comforter, strengthener in place of Jesus who was to leave this earth. The new comforter would guide them into all truth. He would teach them all things. He would give them (this is a miracle) instant recall of all they had ever heard Jesus speak. “He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all things that I said to you.” Jesus said. John 14:26
D. For the apostles Pentecost marked the commencement of the apostolic ministry, the Apostolic Age, when they were empowered and enabled by means of the Holy Spirit to fulfill the commission which Jesus had given to them.
IX. The chapter of Acts 2 begins with the meeting in Jerusalem as commanded. The Holy Spirit came upon them, overwhelming them and empowering them to speak in other languages. Please notice this, other languages. Not an incoherent babble, not a so called ecstatic utterance that needs somebody to interpret. Languages, we’re talking about— “glossais”, (G1100) tongues.
A. In verses 7-8 the people said, “…are not all these which speak Galilaeans?” “And how hear we every man in our own tongue, wherein we were born?” We are not talking about what sometimes happens in so called charismatic meetings when people babble away in some incoherent fashion. We’re talking about languages. We hear them telling in our own tongues the mighty works of God, they said.
B. What was the purpose of this exercise of tongues on the day of Pentecost? In the first place it was practical. I’ve already told you that the Jews were dispersed though the Roman Empire. They learned many languages. They spoke in different languages. There was no one language that could have met the need of that occasion. Consequently, the apostles spoke in languages in which they had not learned.
C. As it was practical so it was also evidential. It was evidential in the sense that it produced the proof that God was working, the Holy Spirit was present and working through these men. It endorsed the truth of the message that they were going to preach. It was the fulfillment of prophecy as Peter points out. He reminds them that in Joel 2:28 that God had said, “And it shall come to pass afterward that I will pour out My Spirit on all flesh; your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions” Peter says, this is that which was spoken by the prophet Joel. This is God’s fulfillment of a promise made hundreds of years earlier.
D. Then, most importantly perhaps, the gift of tongues produced one other effect. It arrested attention. It created the opportunity for preaching because the people listened. Peter goes on to say, the day has finally come. This is what God talked about. God has kept His word and Peter preached the gospel for the first time in the Christian Age. He used the first key. At the right place, at the right time, and he had the right message.
E. If you read Peter’s sermon on the day of Pentecost and remember that “with many other words did he testify and exhort” verse 40, not just with what was written. Almost half of what is recorded of Peter’s sermon consists of quotations from the Old Testament.
1. In the summary we have, Peter told them that Jesus was divinely appointed. He said; Jesus has come in fulfillment of the will of God.
2. Peter says; Jesus is here according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God. Jesus is divinely approved. “a man approved of God among you by miracles and wonders and signs, which God did by him in the midst of you, as ye yourselves also know” verse 22. Jesus is divinely accepted because God has raised Him from the dead and set Him at His own right hand in the heavens, Peter continues.
3. Peter reminded them that David, as a prophet, had spoken of the resurrection of Jesus from the dead. He said that way back in Old Testament times, in the first book of Samuel, the prophet told David that the day shall come when God shall raise up one of your seed to sit on your throne.
4. Peter said; “Men and brethren, let me freely speak unto you of the patriarch David, that he is both dead and buried, and his sepulchre is with us unto this day.” We know that David is dead and this was to happen after he died. We actually know where his grave is. He, being a prophet, and knowing that God has sworn with an oath to him that the fruit of his loins would raise up one to sit on his throne, he, seeing this Pentecost before, spoke of the resurrection of Christ.
F. What is Peter saying? He’s saying that David actually foresaw the resurrection of Jesus from the dead and being raised from the dead to take David’s throne to be the true king. This simply means that Jesus is not going to come someday to set up a kingdom. He’s not in heaven at the moment twiddling His thumbs waiting for the time when He will come back to earth to do something which He didn’t do the first time. Peter said, He was raised from the dead to sit on David’s throne and sitting on David’s throne He has shed forth this which you now see and hear. It concludes with these marvelous words, “let all the house of Israel know assuredly, that God hath made that same Jesus, whom ye have crucified, both Lord and Christ.”
X. Then there was an amazing response. The people said, “What shall we do?” They were stabbed to the heart. They were cut to the heart. They couldn’t deny the logic of the truth of Peter’s message. “What shall we do?”
A. Peter told these people “to repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.” As we have read, those who gladly received His word were baptized and there were added to them about 3,000 souls.
B. That wasn’t the end. “The Lord added to them daily such as were being saved.” There was a continued growth and we read in Acts 4:4 the number came to be about 5,000. Acts 5:14 “And believers were the more added to the Lord, multitudes both of men and women”
C. In Acts 6:7 “the word of God increased; and the number of the disciples multiplied in Jerusalem greatly; and a great company of the priests were obedient to the faith.” The church continued to grow.

CONCLUSION:
Now the question is; can we have the same church today?... There’s no reason why we shouldn’t. If we sow the same seed that Peter sowed on the day of Pentecost, and we put that seed into good responsive soil, we can expect the same harvest. If we enter the kingdom through the door by which the first 3,000 entered, there’s no problem. We’re in the same kingdom.

Enter the same way; you’re in the same kingdom. Preach the same message; you’ll reap the same harvest. That’s what we’re trying to do here in Chardon, what the church is doing throughout the world as a matter of fact. We are to present men and women with the message of Jesus Christ as found in the New Testament. We’re urging upon them the same obedience to the faith. We’re taking people who believe in Jesus, who are sorry for the sins of their past, we’re baptizing them into the kingdom, into Christ, and that brings them into the body of Christ.

Let me say this in conclusion as my time again is past. I believe that the church of the New Testament ought to be the most powerful, the most influential force in the world. She has all the promises of God at her disposal. She has all the power of God. If Christians, like you and me, were to awaken to our potential and to recognize the possibilities and be the kind of church we read about in the New Testament, I believe that the earth would shake with the impact of our message.

Let me say this; Some people have a lot of fire, but they have nothing to cook. We have lots to cook, but we sometimes lack the fire to cook it. We need to strive to get back to being the kind of people that God wants us to be. Let’s let people know what the church of the New Testament was like. Let’s live like those early Christians lived and people will take notice of us - that we’ve been with Jesus and that we’ve learned of Him. They would say, see how these Christians love one another.

That’s just a brief introduction to the birthday of the church. It began at the right place at the right time with the right message. We can have the same church today if we preach the same message. May God bless you.

If you’re subject to the invitation, if you’re not a Christian and you want the Lord to add you to His church, you know the way. If you’re a Christian and have been out of fellowship for whatever reason and you recognize that your place is back in fellowship with the Lord’s people, you know the way. We’re going to sing the song of invitation now. Please come forward in response to this invitation—God’s invitation—while we sing.

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# 644

Reference Sermon
Frank Worgan