The following teaching is the fourth of a series on the Book of Acts by the Reverend John W. Howe of Truro Episcopal Church in Fairfax, Virginia. The title of this teaching is the Apostolic Gospel, and the scripture reference is Acts chapter 2, verses 14 to 42. We ended last time by considering what seemed to be a very deliberate parallel between the ancient, that is, Old Testament celebration of Pentecost as basically an agricultural festival and the Christian celebration of Pentecost recorded in Acts chapter 2. You remember that in the Old Testament we were told that as the very last part of the celebration of Passover, They went out and they gathered the young, immature barley shoots, the little green shoots. They were full of life and full of potential, but they were just little tiny green shoots in anticipation of a harvest.

And they began their counting from that moment. It was 50 days from the gathering and the waving of those sheaves of barley shoots to the harvest of first fruits called Pentecost. And that that carried over into a deliberate parallel in the New Testament, that as the last part of Jesus' atonement, in fact on Easter evening, he came upon his apostles gathered in the upper room, and he breathed on them.

And he said, receive the Holy Spirit. And it was a little breath, just a little breath, full of life, full of potential, full of promise. but it was another 50 days before the Holy Spirit came in his fullness. The sound of the mighty rushing wind, the little breath, and then this great tremendous cataclysm from God and filled them in this earth-shaking kind of a way.

We said in the Old Testament, Pentecost is contained in embryo in the Passover, and the parallel carrying over into the New Testament is that Pentecost is once again tied to and contained in embryo in what happened on Good Friday and Easter. I think you could push it even further than that. It's the Holy Spirit of Jesus.

That's why we in the West have said all down through the centuries, he proceedeth from the Father and the Son. He comes to do the bidding of the Son. Jesus says, I will pray the Father and he will send you, but unless I pray, it isn't going to happen.

It's the Spirit of Jesus. He comes to do the work of Jesus. He comes to glorify Jesus.

Let me put it to you this way, that after this first experience, after this first experience of the 120, it is never again anticipated or expected that anybody else will have to follow the same chronology. of first believe in Jesus, receive the forgiveness of your sins, then wait a certain amount of time, and then receive empowering from the Spirit. It is never expected that that would be the normative chronology from this point on.

It is expected that from this point on, normative Christianity is that you get it all. It's all one. Now, as a matter of fact, you may experience it in a variety of ways.

And we have in the book of the Acts itself a whole variety of patterns of how people came into the fullness, the empowering, the baptism of the Spirit. And if you were to try to reduce that to a single formula, you'd be very frustrated. And we'll see this as the book unfolds.

I'm not going to try to prove this point to you. I'm simply going to call it to your attention and ask you to notice it from here on out that the expectation is that it is indissolubly linked together. It's all one experience.

There are different aspects of it that we can talk about. You can talk about receiving new life. You can talk about having your sins forgiven.

And you can talk about then empowerment by the Spirit for service. But biblically, there seem to be one. So much so that when somebody fails to receive the fullness of the Spirit upon believing, this is considered a major crisis, and immediate steps are taken to correct it.

Do you follow what I'm saying? You may not agree with me at this point. That's okay.

You wait and see. I think this will be borne out as we study it for ourselves. It points up something terribly deficient in the way the church has done it on down through the centuries.

You know, somebody gives their life to Christ or becomes convinced that the gospel is true, and we say, okay, you've got to get into an inquirer's class. You know, and six or eight months later we say, okay, now you can join the church. And then, you know, another year or two later we say, what you really need is to take the Life in the Spirit seminar.

You know, and then you've got to wait and anticipate and pray and get holy, and then we'll lay hands on you, and maybe if you're lucky you'll get it. You know? Biblically, the norm is you believe in Christ immediately.

You get baptized, and that's entering the church, and you better receive it all, or there's a major crisis on our hands. What is wrong? You see.

Now, you watch for that, okay, as we go on. What I'm pointing out to you is that the New Testament expectation is that the fullness of the Spirit, the empowering of the Spirit, is indissolubly linked to the redeeming work of Christ. Okay?

That's all the point I'm trying to make just now. To receive Christ is, biblically, expected to be a matter of receiving His Spirit in power. And the point of the power is what?

Service, and more particularly than that, that you might be my witnesses. Bear that in mind. We're going back to the first lecture.

The point of the power is that you might be my witnesses. Now, God may equip you with a variety of special gifts, special areas of service, and equip you for those, but the overall purpose of the power is that you might be my witnesses. And we remember the pattern is starting here, Jerusalem moving on beyond it, all of Judea, then to Samaria, to the uttermost part.

So watch for this from here on out. I want to make two more comments in terms of the relationship between the ancient celebration of Pentecost and what happened on the Christian day of Pentecost. You remember in the ancient celebration we were talking last week about the fact that when they harvested the barley, they took the barley or the wheat, they ground it into a very fine, very pure white flower.

And we saw something there symbolically of the life of Christ in all of its purity being ground, being crushed, right? And then it's added to oil, which is always the symbol of the Holy Spirit. And in this particular instance, shockingly, it's added to leaven, which is the sign of corruption, and in this case our own human failure, our fallibility.

Those are the constituent elements of the loaves that are to be baked for the celebration of Pentecost back in the olden days. It's interesting to me that what they were commanded to make out of all this was two loaves. Not one.

Two loaves. Two loaves which are identical. Two loaves which are made of exactly the same stuff.

So it's two that are one. All right? two throughout all of the scripture is the sign of witness of perfect witness of testimonial somebody is convicted on the evidence of two witnesses if you have only one evidence they throw you out of court two witnesses it's the sign of witness i think as a matter of fact that's why we have two testaments old and new goes right over into the new testament talks about the two witnesses who will be there bearing witness in the last days.

And I want to just suggest, it may be that we have a hint here in the ancient celebration of Pentecost, we have a hint here of what in fact began to transpire as of the day of Pentecost. That what was mixed together and began to rise was the two loaves of the church, the Jew first, and the others. Two, which have thus far always been two and utterly distinct, but which as of this day are one.

Two and one. And you remember the preaching is always from here on out to the Jew first and to the Gentile. And Paul can say there's no distinction and yet to the Jew first and to the Gentile.

There are two and yet one. On the very day of Pentecost, on this very day, the 120 had their experience, and within a matter of either minutes or perhaps it was an hour, we don't know exactly how long, 3,000 others also had the same experience. The Jew first, and then this amalgam of visiting Jews and proselytes and others from all over the world.

You with me? Just a hint, just a hint there. The beginning of a new bread, two loaves which in fact are one and the same.

And that, by the way, indicates the very thing that I was just saying. The 3,000 got it all at once. They didn't believe in Jesus and then sit around waiting for 50 days and be visited by the Spirit. They got it all at once.

And finally, the third tie-in here, if you will. I mentioned last time that Pentecost was also recognized traditionally by the Jews as the anniversary of the giving of the law to Moses. Now, isn't that interesting that on the Christian day of Pentecost, what God did, in fact, was what he promised to do through all of the prophets.

I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel, not like the old covenant with the law written on stony tablets, but I will write my law on their hearts. And that's what he did on the day of Pentecost. The Holy Spirit came to indwell them, to make them empowered with a new life from God, and he wrote it on their hearts.

This is the inauguration of a new covenant relationship for God's people in the church. Jeremiah 31 is one of many passages in which that's predicted. So, the Spirit came with this mighty rushing wind, this cataclysm of sound, a great sheet of fire, obviously got the attention of everybody in the city of Jerusalem.

The fire then broke into individual tongues, lighted upon the individual heads of the 120. Whether this happened in the temple itself or somewhere nearby, it obviously brought everything else to a dead halt. Completely overshadowed the ritual that was going on in the temple itself.

Everybody said, what in the world is that? What is that about? It ground everything to a halt.

And we read, some mocked, these guys are just drunk. When's the last time they said that about your worship service? You were having so much fun, you obviously were drunk, right?

some were genuinely interested asking what does this mean all were amazed that's where we ended last time and verse 14 Peter we're in chapter 2 verse 14 Peter standing with the eleven lifted up his voice and addressed them and gave the first sermon of the Christian church I'd like to analyze that sermon just very quickly I'd love to take the time to really go through it in depth, but I'm not going to do that. I want to just call to your attention, there's something interesting about this sermon, in terms of the structure of it. I can find seven major points in this sermon.

And if you look for them, you'll find them in virtually every other sermon in the book of Acts. There is a seven-point gospel that the apostles preached. and that might be very helpful to you if you want to try to share the gospel with some of your friends you know one group has its four spiritual laws another group has its four spiritual words another group has this summary another group has that summary we have the Kennedy way of doing it we have this way and that way and so on if you want to do it the way the apostles did it you've got a seven point gospel alright sometimes they will expand upon one point and very quickly summarize another.

On occasion, for instance, when they're preaching to Gentiles, they'll leave out one point altogether, which is what the prophets had to say about all this, because the Gentiles didn't have the prophets. It's an interesting point in which Paul is preaching the gospel to a bunch of Gentiles in Athens on Mars Hill, and instead of talking about the Old Testament prophets, what he does is quote some of their own secular philosophers. verse.

Absolutely fascinating little tour de force that he pulls on them. Seven points Peter makes. Number one, what the prophets said.

And that is typically where they began. Here's what the prophets said about the coming of Messiah. You know these scriptures.

Let me remind you of them. Here's what the Word of God, what we recognize, the Old Testament, here's what it said in anticipation of Messiah. Then they turn right around and talk about what Jesus did.

That's the second point. And it's very clear. These are one and the same.

What the prophet said and what Jesus did are one and the same. Who is he? He's the anticipated Messiah.

There's a quick allusion to this, and you bear in mind, of course, that this and all the other speeches are just summaries. They're just sort of outlines of what was really said. It concludes by saying in verse 40, and he testified with many other words, so you don't have the full account.

This is just a quick summary. But there's an allusion to this in verse 16 and following when he quotes from Joel, and in verse 25 and following when he quotes from David, and elsewhere he quotes David a little bit later on again, verse 34. What the prophets said is where they typically begin.

Secondly, what Jesus did. These are one and the same. Suggest if you want to present the gospel to your friends, it wouldn't hurt to have some familiarity with what the scripture says about it, what the prophets in particular said about it, and what Jesus did.

So we're operating not just out of my personal experience, but out of the word of God. We use our experience as the appetizer, the tantalizer. But we need to understand that there's a difference between witnessing which tells what happened to me and preaching the gospel which tells what happened 2,000 years ago.

You follow what I'm saying? My witness may tempt the person, may tantalize the person to get hungry for the real thing. Okay.

The gospel is not what happened to me. The gospel is what happened on a cross 2,000 years ago. Thirdly, very interestingly, you find this in virtually all the sermons what you did.

What you did. And of course this primarily to the Jews of that generation it's very strong but by implication what all of us did. We rejected this Messiah whom God sent among us.

Look at verse 23. This Jesus delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God you crucified and killed by the hands of lawless men. the expected, anticipated, promised, prophesied Messiah who has finally come amongst us, you crucified.

It's a real accusation of guilt and responsibility. And that needs to be made. All of us were there.

You know, who put Jesus to death? Was it the Jews? Yes.

It was also the Romans, and it was also you and me. We nailed them to the cross. Fourthly, what God did.

and he goes right from that you crucified and killed by the hands of lawless men but God raised him up having loosed the pangs of death because it was not possible for him to be held by it death did all it could to the Lord Jesus and it couldn't do enough death did all it could and it couldn't do enough what God did verse 24 Also verse 36, an even more ringing affirmation, Let all the house of Israel therefore know assuredly that God has made him both Lord and Christ, this Jesus whom you crucified. What we are doing now, fifthly, we are bearing witness, in fact eyewitness account, of his resurrection and his enthronement. Verse 52.

Sixth, what you may do, what you may do, the point of this sermon is you may do something about all of this. You are guilty before Almighty Holy God. You are guilty of having rejected and killed the author of life, his chosen Messiah, the anointed one, the Savior of the world.

You are guilty of it, but you may repent, put your trust in him, believe. And finally, what will happen? Verse 38 and following.

Peter said to them, Repent, 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. The very same thing that has happened to us will also happen to you. Baptism, incorporation into the church, forgiveness of sins, the purchase of blood, Repent, believe, be baptized, and you shall receive all of it.

That is a little seven-point outline, and I think if you bear that in mind and think of the appropriate scriptures that would go with each of those points, I think you have an enormously helpful summary at your fingertips of what the apostolic gospel includes. One, here's what the prophets said. Two, here's what Jesus did.

Three, here's what you did. four here's what God did in spite of it five here's what we are doing now we are speaking out of our experience much more than that but we have experienced something of what we're proclaiming to you six what you can do about all this notice the order bad news first good news second until you know that you're guilty you have no appreciation of God's provision for you until you know you're in trouble, the offer of help is not going to mean anything. You are guilty, he says.

But here's what you can do about it. And seven, here's what the result will be. I think if you watch, you'll find this same pattern being repeated over and over and over. Sometimes it's altered a little bit, it's rearranged a little bit, and as I say, sometimes one point is expanded and another one passed over very, very quickly.

That is the apostolic gospel. Another point regarding it that's very interesting, you may recall in the first lecture I made the comment that Mark was, among other things, the secretary to Peter. And Mark's gospel is, in fact, a summary of the kind of preaching that Peter did.

It is, in fact, one very long sermon. And if you want to go back and have a real enjoyable time of personal Bible study, just compare Mark's gospel with this little outline that I've given you. It fits point for point.

That's Peter's preaching. That's the kind of preaching that he did. And Mark simply records it at somewhat greater length.

Watch for this. Now, the signs that are mentioned here in the prophecy of Joel and the signs which stimulate the asking of the question, what is going on here? What does this all mean?

Peter starts his sermon by reference to what the prophet Joel said. In verse 17 he says, In the last days it shall be, God declares, that I'll pour out my Spirit upon all flesh. Your sons and your daughters shall prophesy.

Your young men shall see visions. Your old men shall dream dreams. Yea, and on my menservants and my maidservants in those days I will pour out my spirit and they shall prophesy.

And I'll show wonders in the heaven above and signs in the earth beneath, blood and fire, vapor and smoke. The sun shall be turned into darkness, the moon into blood, before the day of the Lord comes, the great and manifest day. And it shall be that whoever calls upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.

If you go back and read that, you'll find it in Joel's prophecy, the end of chapter 2. And I want to suggest to you that the interesting thing about this is that the signs were only partially fulfilled at the time that Peter preached this. Now, in a small way, you find these signs in the crucifixion story itself.

You know, there is blood. There is the darkening of the sun. When the sun is darkened, obviously, the moon also is darkened. And maybe you've seen the moon when the sun is very overcast. It looks like it's bloody red. It turns to red. So there's a certain sense in which this has already happened.

There have been signs in the heavens. This great cataclysm has just taken place. That's why people are interested in it.

But there's another sense in which this is anticipating something much bigger yet to come. The day of the Lord yet to come. Right?

And I want to suggest to you that once again we have the experience here of multiple fulfillment. Or put it another way, what took place on the day of Pentecost is itself but another beginning. It began in Passover.

It began in the atonement. It has come to a certain kind of fruition, but the very name of the Pentecost celebration is the harvest of first fruits. There are more fruits yet to come.

There's going to be a much greater harvest, the day of the Lord. The day of Pentecost anticipates the ingathering at the end of the growing season, right? The spring rains, long dry season, then the autumn rains, much more abundant, much heavier growing season, and the ingathering at tabernacle's time, okay?

So that Peter quoting these words and applying them to Pentecost is also anticipating something much bigger further down the road. We are in the era of the Holy Spirit, the epic of the Holy Spirit, okay? Inaugurated, if you will, on the day of Pentecost.

But please, if you get nothing else out of this whole blessed study, okay, however many weeks it goes on, may I beg you, don't look back longingly to the day of Pentecost. The best is yet to come. The best is yet to come, okay?

Amen. The signs mentioned here, it's interesting, isn't it? It says your sons and your daughters shall prophesy.

That didn't happen. Your young men shall see visions. That didn't happen.

Your old men shall dream dreams. That didn't happen. You know, what happened was they're speaking in tongues, which isn't even mentioned there, okay?

But in other words, it's of this sort. This sort of thing is being inaugurated on this day. It hasn't ended.

It didn't end with the death of the last apostle. Sorry about your Schofield reference Bible. The best is yet to come.

Bigger and better, okay? I'm interested that when people said, what does all this mean? Peter did not get up and give a lengthy discourse on the baptism of the Holy Spirit.

He doesn't even mention the speaking in tongues that occasioned the question. He doesn't even mention it. What he does is leaps immediately from this to the proclamation of the finished work of Christ.

And the point of the power is? that you shall be my witnesses. The point of the power is that they shall proclaim Christ.

There's a lot of funny argument within the church about what is the initial sign of the Holy Spirit. What is the sign of the filling of the Spirit? What is the sign of the empowerment of the Spirit?

I want to tell you. the initial result of the Spirit is proclaiming Jesus. He shall glorify me.

That's exactly what happened. The Holy Spirit is very shy about himself. He comes to call attention to Christ.

That's exactly what happened here. He's not calling attention to himself. He gets their attention.

But he proclaims Christ. He exalts Christ, the finished work of Christ. this is the true evidence of the Holy Spirit the offer and the results we've already alluded to in spite of the fact that you are guilty and you deserve everlasting damnation so do all the rest of us in spite of that fact God in his mercy in his graciousness he saw what you were going to do he worked it into his plan you think you killed Christ sure you did but he knew all about it before that ever came into your mind He wove it into his plan.

He made the most ignominious miscarriage of justice in the history of the world into the opportunity for the greatest blessing that mankind has ever received. And he offers you complete, total absolution, forgiveness of sins, a new beginning, incorporation into his body. How do you do it?

Repent. Be baptized. Believe.

and you shall receive the gift. It's all one, and the emphasis is, do it now. Do it right now.

And they do. And the scripture says, verse 41, so those who received his word were baptized and there were added that day about 3,000 souls. And it goes on to give, in the last verse that I want to look at today, this little statement, And they, that is all 3,000 and others who were being added day by day, they devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers.

Those are the four marks of the apostolic church. Any church which is not committed to those four things has no claim to being a fully apostolic church. They devoted themselves, they continued in, number one, the apostles' teaching.

If the apostles got it wrong, we all got it wrong. But if the apostles got it right, you better pay attention. Okay?

They devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching. Any church which does not take as the norm for all of its life and doctrine what the apostles said has no claim to being God's church in the fullest sense of the word. It is not a matter of what this committee or that committee or the House of Bishops decides.

It is not a matter of taking a Gallup poll. It is not a matter of three out of five dentists surveyed. It is what the apostles said.

Okay? And fellowship. Teaching.

We're not interested in just cold doctrine. We're interested in warm fellowship. apostles teaching and fellowship to come to Jesus Christ is of necessity to come to the other people who come to him there is no such thing as a private relationship with Christ there is no such thing it is a self contradiction the guy who says I don't need the church I can have just as good a relationship with the Lord all by myself does not know the Lord you don't know Jesus but by virtue of knowing him in and through his body to the breaking of bread and we'll see more about that next time I think this means both the kind of meal we've just shared here the fellowship meal the sharing of a meal and more particularly the identification with Christ by the breaking of bread and sharing of wine in his name identifying with his body It means both.

And to the prayers. Those four marks. Do you know that those of you who are Episcopalians, in the baptismal service, either you or whoever sponsored you, made a promise that you would continue in the apostles' teaching and fellowship, in the breaking of bread, and in the prayers.

And those of you who were confirmed at the hands of a bishop we're asked to reaffirm that same promise. Will you continue in the apostles' teaching and fellowship in the breaking of bread and in the prayers? And the answer in both cases is, I will by God's help.

Let's bow our heads together. Father in heaven, we would be those committed to and continuing in the apostles' teaching. Lord, inform and instruct our minds by the word of God.

Cause us with Timothy to study, to show ourselves approved unto God. Workmen who don't need to be ashamed, who rightly divide the word of your truth. Lord, we would be those who are committed to and continue in the fellowship of your body.

And we're reminded of the words of Jesus himself, that this will be the evidence that we are truly his disciples, the quality of our love for each other. Lord, forgive us if there's anything that we've allowed to break or hinder that fellowship. Give us your grace and courage to do everything in our power with your help to make right those broken relationships.

Lord, we would be those who are committed to and continue in the breaking of bread, who find in this celebration a means of grace by which we continually proclaim the Lord's death until He come again. And we would be those who continue in and are committed to the reality, the privilege, the excitement, the power of prayer. Because you have chosen to hear our prayer as we offer it in the name of Christ.

We thank you, Father. Thank you for Peter's sermon. Thank you for this gospel message.

Thank you that we are among those who day by day you are adding to your church for Christ's sake. Amen.