Acts 1:8
But you will receive power, the Holy Spirit having come upon you. And you will be My witnesses— both in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and as far as the last place of the earth.
As a child I remember my dad use to love challenging my siblings and me with riddles. And the one riddle I am particular fond of is, “As I was going to St. Ives, I met a man with seven wives, each wife had seven sacks, each sack had seven cats, each cat had seven kits: Kits, cats, sacks, and wives, how many were there going to St. Ives?”
I remember us sitting around for what seemed like days, trying to correctly calculate the total number of folk going to St. Ives. I don’t know what clued us, but finally we did get the right answer. But not until we unnecessarily agonized over a simple riddle where the answer was right in front of our faces.
Our struggles came because we tried to use logic over listening...brains over paying attention. We were more interested in showing our superior intellect and demonstrating our mathematical prowess than answering the question. And unfortunately that’s a problem that persist to this very day in varied areas of our lives.
One of the most hotly debated, contentious and riddled concepts in modern church culture is the advent of Pentecost. Some folk think of it as a church denomination. Others consider it a high and holy expression, reserved for a righteous few. Even more think of it as an ancient event never to be replicated or repeated. But in truth, Pentecost is none of those things.
Aside from the historic Jewish celebration of the same name, modern Christendom has named the corporate outpouring of the Holy Spirit, Pentecost, because it occurred during that holiday. And yes, fantastic events occurred. It began as the sound of a rushing mighty wind entered into a room filled with praying believers. And the writer testifies that it appeared that flames of fire, or tongues of fire, sat upon each of them in the room. And that they all began to speak in unknown tongues. This, by anyone’s definition, was an epic occasion. But what did it mean? What was its purpose?
My knee-jerk reaction would normally be to equate that great and wonderful experience to receiving salvation. But remember I’m the same kid that tried to figure out how many cats went to St. Ives. The answer to Pentecost (and St. Ives) is in the original text. You have to go back and carefully read what it says, not what you hope it’s saying.
We can’t call it the impetus of salvation, because salvation was accomplished at Calvary. Jesus had already proclaimed, “IT IS FINISHED”. It can’t be said to establish believers, because many believed (and believe) that haven’t had a similar experience. So what does it mean?
In the case of Acts 1:8, according to Jesus, the net results from the infilling of the Holy Spirit (Holy Ghost) would be to create witnesses that would testify to the entire world. It wasn’t to make new superpower heroes or Christian elitist; it was to quality a team of witnesses.
Let me give you an example. In a court of law, there are two types of evidence entered to win a case in question: Circumstantial evidence and Direct evidence. Circumstantial evidence is evidence that relies on an inference to connect it to a conclusion of fact—such as a fingerprint at the scene of a crime. By contrast, direct evidence supports the truth of an assertion directly—i.e., without need for any additional evidence or inference.
Dear Children of God, I think we have something here. As believers, we all believed based on circumstantial evidence. We came to Christ, got baptized, joined the choir and attended church, mostly based on circumstantial evidence. And God honors that. But every now and then, Jesus will drop by and reveal himself to you through a visitation by the Holy Ghost. At those times, and in those situations, you now have a new testimony. No longer are you relying on circumstantial evidence. You are not depending on someone else’s testimony. When the Living Christ touches you with his Spirit, you have direct evidence. And the world needs to know it.
God Bless
(By the way: the answer to the riddle is one)
