STORY SETTING AND BACKGROUND

PENTECOST

After Christ's ascension. the disciples returned to Jerusalem to await the outpouring of the Spirit on Pentecost. Peter preaches a powerful sermon. Three thousand are baptized.

Acts 1:1-12; 2:1-42

The outpouring of the Holy Spirit came on the important feast of Pentecost, also known as the Feast of Weeks and Feast of the First Fruits. It was one of the three major festivals of the Jews.

Many Jews living outside of Palestine in the Dispersion preferred to attend this festival rather than the Passover. The latter often came when the sailing season had just reopened after the winter storms. It was much safer for them to wait and sail to Jerusalem for the Pentecost rather than for the Passover feast.

Luke tells us in Acts that the apostles and other Jewish Christians at Jerusalem kept on worshipping in the temple. Acts 3:11 and 5:12 suggest that they often met on Solomon's Porch, a beautiful colonnade in the court of the Gentiles along the east wall of the Temple. Some think that the Pentecost event took place here. This would harmonize with the fact that so many easily found them when they heard the sound like a violent blast of wind, also that about 3000 souls were added to the number of believers on that day.

A CROWD GATHERS

To indicate the outpouring of the Holy Spirit God sent tongues like flames resting on each of the apostles. They were also given the ability to speak in other languages.

Many were led by these events to the place where the disciples were. Acts 2:5 explicitly states that all were Jews. A caref1!i reading indicates that many had ret!:trned from the Dispersion, from countries outside of Palestine, to live at Jerusalem. These were descendants of the Ten Tribes, exiled in 722 B.C., and of the people of Judah, exiled in 586 B.C.

Someone has pointed out that the description used by Luke parallels the customary description in the first century of the civilized world.

The people were puzzled that the apostles, all of them native Palestinians, told them about God's wonderful works in their own languages. Then Peter got up and addressed them to share with them the Good News and to confront them with the need for faith, repentance and obedience in baptism.

Both Peter's sermon and Paul's address in the synagogue at Antioch in Pisidia (Acts 13: 16-47) give us examples of how the apostles told their hearers that in Jesus Christ the Messianic promises of the Old Testament had been fulfilled.

Peter quotes from Joel 2: 28-32 to indicate that the Messianic age had begun. From references in the New Testament and various writings of the Jews we learn what they expected would happen.

A sign of the beginning of this age was the coming of God's Spirit to the land.

The beginning of the Messianic era was known as "the day of the Lord." The Jews thought that it would see the destruction of the Roman overlords, foreigners living in the land, and of social and religious outcasts. The Messiah would be a great, victorious king who would rule his people with justice and righteousness. In this age they would again be able to live as God's covenant people.

Peter told them that in Jesus of Nazareth the prophecies of the Old Testament had been fulfilled. God Himself had demonstrated this fact through the miracles which Jesus had performed. These testified that He had been sent by God.

Those present knew that Jesus had been crucified for treason pretending to be "king of the Jews." The Jewish expectations of the Messiah saw him only as a victorious king, not as a suffering Messiah. But Peter emphasized that this was part of God's plan. The crucified Christ did not remain in the grave even as His illustrious ancestor David had foretold long ago in Psalms 16:8-11 (vv. 25-33). Jesus had been raised from the dead and had gone to sit at the right hand of God (v. 34; Psalm 11 0: 1). He is the Messiah ("Christ" is the Greek for "the Anointed One," the Messiah). He is also Lord, the Lord of the Universe.

Peter's closing words stressed the people's need to accept Jesus as Lord in faith. Peter's hearers were crushed and asked, "What should we do?" In his answer Peter laid down the requirements of repentance and baptism. As a result about 3000 were baptized into the body of believers on that day.

THE LIFE IN THE CHURCH

The early apostolic church was intent to be loyal to the teaching which the apostles had received from Jesus. The believers also lived in close and intimate fellowship with each other. This expressed itself also in the meals which they shared with each other and also in common prayer. We need to remember that in the Hebrew thought pattern eating together symbolized entering into close fellowship.

Jerusalem was known for its many poor who faced a life of deep poverty. This was true also of at least some of the believers. Some of those who had land and property chose to sell what they had so that they could thereby ease the lot of the poor. This, however, was voluntary. As Peter emphasized to Ananias and Sapphira, no one was pressured to do this.