The Power of Pentecost

In this inspiring sermon, Daniel McInnes explores the significance of Pentecost and its role in the culmination of salvation history. He emphasizes the empowerment of believers through the Holy Spirit to bring Christ's liberation to the world. McInnes calls on the faithful to embrace their role in spreading the message of salvation and bringing in the harvest of souls.

Transcript

In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, amen. Today is the feast of Pentecost, and we know that the feast of Pentecost comes 50 days after the resurrection of Christ. Interestingly, if you look at it, it's like a book. It opens up; you have the beginning of Lent, you've got the resurrection in the middle, and then you've got Pentecost at the end. It's basically the same period of time. So we're looking at the end of something. What are we looking at the end of? Pentecost represents the culmination of salvation history in a sense. Christ came to this earth to bring an end, to put to death, and to empty hell—not your servants—to put to death all of those things that have plagued human beings ever since the fall.

So Christ came to do that, but in himself, he came as a man. So he's walking around on the earth in a particular place at a particular time in Jerusalem, in the areas around Galilee and around Israel. He's walking around in that time, and as a single person, there's only so many people that you can touch. There's only so many people you can deal with, and it was always his intention that he would not stay because that's not the way that salvation was planned to come to the world. The plan of salvation was that the people of God would be the channels of God's presence in this world and bring salvation to the world. So it had to be that Jesus had to ascend. Right now, Jesus has ascended to the right hand of the Father. It says, "The Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool." He sits enthroned in heaven and rules in the midst of his enemies—not that the people of the world are enemies; it's the demons, the powers of darkness that still are around but have been subjugated to his power. But they're still around, so he rules in the midst of his enemies.

And we now, having come to Pentecost, receive the power from God to go out into the world and bring that liberation that he's given to us to all of the people of this world. I just want to go back to the beginning of Christ's ministry. In Luke 4, he goes into the synagogue in Nazareth, which is where he's grown up, and he takes the scroll and he starts to read from Isaiah. We don't get the whole reading from Isaiah; we just get part of it. This is the reading from Isaiah. This is what Jesus is reading from, and the people who are hearing it at that time in the synagogue would have known the whole thing. They would have known the whole reading, but he only read part of it. This is what the book of Isaiah says: "The spirit of the sovereign Lord is upon me because the Lord has chosen me. He's commissioned me to encourage the poor, to help the brokenhearted, to decree the release of captives and the freeing of prisoners, to announce the year when the Lord will show his favor, the day when our God will seek vengeance, to console all who mourn, strengthen those who mourn in Zion by giving them a turban instead of ashes, oil symbolizing joy instead of mourning, a garment symbolizing praise instead of discouragement. They'll be called oaks of righteousness, trees planted by the Lord to reveal his splendor. They will rebuild the perpetual ruins and restore the places that were desolate. They will reestablish the ruined cities, the places that have been desolate since ancient times."

As we continue to read through, we see the whole intention. Christ read the first part because at the beginning of his ministry, he said, "This is being fulfilled in your presence." The source and the power of the resurrection had come into the world. He hadn't died and been resurrected yet, but the process had started. What he's saying is his purpose, and because of the resurrection and through the giving of the Holy Spirit, our purpose is to bring that, as it's talking about here, to reestablish the broken-down cities, to bring the garments symbolizing praise instead of discouragement, and so on and so forth. All of these things now become the things that we do—not things that Christ did those things in his earthly ministry, but they become things that we do.

So we've spent the last really 100 days, if you go from the beginning of Lent right through to now, we've spent the last 100 days in this kind of special period of preparation and then celebration of what Christ has done. But it's all leading up to something. It's all leading up to now. The Holy Spirit has come. Now it's time to work. Now it's time for us to work. The Holy Spirit comes, and he works in us. Under the old covenant law, you could deal with sin through sacrifices and so on. You could do those things, but it was temporary. It was never designed to do something that would last. But since the Holy Spirit has come and dwells in us, he is continuously making us clean. He's continuously making us holy as we cooperate with him. The holiness of God ought to be growing in us, and as it grows in us, we become more and more effective in bringing that to the world. So it's time for us to work. It's time for us to do what we're supposed to do.

So we go back to what you could call normal time, normal time of the year when we enter into the everyday life of fasting and prayer and all the usual things that we do week by week, day by day. All of those things. Today we'll have the kneeling vespers of Pentecost, the first day that we will kneel since the resurrection, and that's an indication that we're back in the time when it's penitential, repentance. We're doing the work. So it's up to us. Christ has given us everything. He died for us, rose again from the dead, and by going and being now established on the throne in heaven and sending the Holy Spirit, has empowered us to not only be cleansed ourselves but to bring that power of the resurrection to the whole world.

So right now, we need to understand that it's up to us. The Holy Spirit is with us, but we are the tools. We are the people through whom the world will be affected. We are the people through whom salvation comes. The feast of Pentecost is also, if you go back to the Old Testament, the feast of weeks. Has anyone heard of the feast of weeks? There's a direct connection where it comes from. The feast of weeks was the harvest feast. Around this time in the northern hemisphere, it's the end of spring, beginning of summer. It's harvest time. It's the feast of the first fruits. So they would bring in the first fruits of the harvest to the temple in thanksgiving to God. We read in the epistle today, the apostles, the Holy Spirit fell on them, and immediately what happens? They start speaking in all these languages, and all the Jews around who are hearing the word of God being spoken in their own language start coming along, and we know what happens. Thousands of people are added immediately to the followers of Jesus Christ—the first fruits. That's what this is all about, bringing in the harvest, bringing in the harvest. The whole world is full of people who are waiting to hear about Christ—not necessarily in words, but they at least need to see it in us. As they do that, the feast continues. It's like a continuous thing where the people keep coming in, and glory is being given to God. So that's our work. That's what we're here for. May the Lord help us to do that and continue to do that. We need encouragement. We need help. We need to be sustained through this life because it's difficult. The modern world makes things hard, makes things difficult, but the Holy Spirit is with us. Christ is with us. We are empowered to do this. He's given us the power to do it, so we need to just walk in it and do it. It feels hard sometimes, feels difficult, but that's just the path of salvation. We need to bring that life to the people around us, bring it to all because God has given us that duty, that job. So let us bring in the harvest. May the Lord help us to do that. Amen.