JUN 8 2025 | 50 Days: Road to Pentecost S1E7 | Tongues of Fire…Flame of Love

Sea Change Church · JUN 8 2025 | 50 Days: Road to Pentecost S1E7 - Tongues of Fire...Flame of Love
Acts 2:1-4
Automated transcript. Not reviewed for accuracy.

The leadership would always be Seeking your guidance On how we can partner with you That there would be input Across the board From all of our members And congregants About the different ministries And the different missions And all of the things And that there would just be A real sense of community here As we move forward In lockstep with you I pray that you will receive Every little bit Of our offering Whether it be tithes Or service Or whatever it is And that you would use it all Lord, to expand your kingdom In Jesus' name we pray Amen The Acts of the Apostles Chapter 2 Verses 1-4 And 11b When the day of Pentecost arrived They were all together In one place And suddenly there came from heaven A sound Like a mighty rushing wind And it filled the entire house Where they were sitting And divided tongues As of fire appeared to them And rested on each one of them And they were all filled With the Holy Spirit And began to speak In other tongues As the Spirit gave them utterance Declaring the mighty works of God This is the word of the Lord Happy Pentecost Pastor Adam sends his greetings From merry old England And he sent me something recently He said last Thursday He was looking at his app On the phone The Merriam Webster Dictionary app And the Every day they have a word for the day And last Thursday's was Sea change And he thought you should know And he said that Everybody should know That there's a sea change in store for you On Pentecost Because of Pentecost And also In Jesus Christ The definition of sea change given Was a big change In A big and sudden change Or transformation If we become new creations In Jesus Christ Certainly we've had a big and sudden change So he sends his greetings Pastor Adam speaking of He has made some bold and very And maybe even some risky moves recently And one of those risky moves Was he invited me A certified And card carrying Pentecostal To give a sermon on Pentecost And on Pentecost Sunday no less Would you be interested?

He says to me And talking about Pentecost Reminded me of something N.T. Wright once wrote He said Asking me Asking me if I would be interested As a Pentecostal To preach on Pentecost Is like asking a Thirsty Irishman If he'd like a pint of Guinness Usual humility and grace I said I think I can work something through Thank you very much By the way Someone came to me recently And said You shouldn't call yourself A Pentecostal I said why Sounds legitimate to me What's wrong with that?

The person said I think you're a holy roller I said Well I just wanted to disabuse Everybody of the idea That I'm a holy roller I haven't done any holy rolling For decades Last time I did any holy rolling Was as you see in the In the image up there And you notice the halo I was the holiest roller there In the rink But no Pentecostal is perfectly acceptable Along with the word charismatic Usually what Pentecostals are Are those that came to the To the Pentecostal reality In the early 20th century Charismatics back in 1960s, 70s, 80s and so on Following there But there's an interesting Distinction of meaning In the word Pentecostal Versus charismatic Even though it refers to The same people experiencing The same thing Pentecostal means I'm of or related to Pentecost The meaning of the Pentecostal The meaning of the Pentecostal feast In the Bible And charismatic Sort of narrows it down a little bit A charismatic is interested in The charismata The charismata is a Greek word For the gifts of the Holy Spirit Emphasis there is on the gifts Of the Holy Spirit And so This becomes important In a certain sense Because sometimes we think When we think of Pentecost Usual understanding Usual understanding Oh Pentecost That's when the Holy Spirit Came down And it anointed the church And they went forth Being able to proclaim Or in proclamation Of the gospel As well as in demonstration Of the gospel With the gifts and the signs And the wonders The difficulty with that Is that That's not what Pentecost Is fully Fully about It's partly that But it's something Much bigger than that If we just If we just accept Pentecost Pentecost is for the proclamation And the demonstration Of the gospel Then what we What we are I'll just say We should be cautious About Is that We need to remember What Jesus said In Matthew 7 He says Many will come to me In that day Having done great And mighty works They cast out demons They did mighty Miracles And so forth And the Lord Will say to them Or I will say to them He says What?

I never knew you Depart from me You workers of iniquity Because they were so enamored With the power And with the demonstration Of the power That they forgot The deeper meaning Of Pentecost And what is the deeper meaning Of Pentecost You have to ask that Well let's go back To Acts chapter 1 Verse 8 And we looked at that Last week Of Pastor Adam But you shall receive power Yay!

Power Dynamis Dunamis You shall receive power When the Holy Spirit Comes upon you And you shall be What's the next word? Witnesses Of me Both in Jerusalem Judea Samaria To the uttermost parts Of the earth So we have to go back To that is the essential nature Of the commission That we're given At Pentecost To become witnesses Of Jesus Christ So what exactly Does it mean to be a witness?

We looked at that A little bit last week As well But I want to explore it Some more A witness Of Jesus Christ Is someone that best This is going to sound redundant But exhibits The essential thing About Jesus And I I wanted to go back And narrow down Jesus If you had to narrow down Jesus The one distinctive That makes him different From anything else What would you say That one distinctive is And makes you And that you can be a witness of?

And so is it the fact That he had power Of the Holy Spirit? Certainly did Did he raise the dead? He performed miracles? All of those things But is that the distinctive That defines Jesus Christ? So I kept thinking about that And the one thing That I find That Jesus That is distinctive About Jesus Is that Was that In his relationship With his heavenly father He related To the father in love The father related To him in love At the Jordan baptism The father said This is my beloved son In whom I am well pleased That was the treasure Of treasures To Jesus' heart That was the one thing That he lived for To hear and obey the father In fact In John 12 50 He says And this is eternal life The commandments Are eternal life And so Just to hear The father's voice And to live By the father And so So I said So okay To be a witness Of Jesus Christ Means much more Than power And it means much more Than dramatic Works The thesis Of today's message Is simply that Pentecost Is about the church Relating to God Just as Jesus Did to his father And not only that But exhibiting In its life Together The same kind Of Trinitarian life That Jesus had With the father And with the holy spirit That's really What we're looking at So the one thing That God wants for us Is to know The father In the son By the holy spirit Whatever form That may take I've shared this In every class I've taught So pardon me If you've heard it A few times But there was An old bible teacher Many years ago He's passed on now But he One of his students Asked him Came to open And said Teacher What's the point Of it all What's God Really after What's the end Result What does God want What's the point Of it all And the teacher Looked him in the eye And he said One word Fellowship God wants Fellowship With his people With his kids With his children The relationship Of the father And the son And the holy spirit Each one relating In love with the other They're not They're not just A holy huddle They just want to They just want to Bring everyone All of the family Into that relationship Of love That they share They want to And so that's What the wonderful Thing about Acts 2 verse 1 We sort of think That's sort of Setting the scene And it was For the rushing Mighty wind And the tongues of fire But the one Essential element there Was it says what When the day of Pentecost Had fully come They were all Together Or they were all Of the king James says Of one accord In one place Two things Are there They were of One accord And they were In proximity One with another They were in a place And they were Together with In that one place In one accord That word means Unity That means They'd been waiting For ten days Anticipating the coming Of the promise Of the father And everything Was broken down They just They were all Pure anticipation By this time They were fully united I kind of picture The holy spirit In unity With the father And the son He has this Commission to come Down And he just Sees At unity The 120 And united One accord And he just Says It's just like I share In fellowship With the father And the son I'm just eager So he's just Waiting for the command To just come down As a rushing mighty wind And fill them With the love of God And the relationship Because he's called What?

The holy spirit In second corinthians Last verse of the chapter The very benediction That paul gives To the corinthians At the very end Of that letter He says This is the benediction May the grace Of the lord jesus Christ And the love of god And the fellowship Of the holy spirit Be with you all That's what paul Really wished Above all things For the corinthians That troublesome Congregation Back then Right So that's the one thing The basic charge Is that we love The father And the son And the holy spirit Just as And their love And that we Emulate that We live in that Together as his disciples In the old testament Pentecost Is one of seven feasts And there was three feasts In the springtime Passover Unleavened bread First fruits And there were three feasts In the fall Seven months later Trumpets Atonement And tabernacles And those feasts The beginning and the end Are prophetic of something The first is that Symbolizes or pictures The work of jesus For us on the cross The forgiveness of sins Making it possible To be forgiven And then the last three feasts Speak about Speaks about the end Of the age When God's Tabernacling with man And peace is Reigning in the kingdoms Of this world Become the kingdoms Of our lord And of his christ And in between This little orphan feast Called Pentecost And what the Pentecost is Is that Jesus did the work On calvary And he's got a plan To end it In tabernacles But in between He has to He has to bring That work to pass And so he does it He decided Through you He's decided To come down And empower the church That they can be The proclamation Of the work Of jesus christ Making us Co-laborers With god On the earth And the scripture I like about this Is ephesians 3 Verse 10 there It says And unto Now unto Through the church Would be Might Through the church Might be made known The manifold wisdom Of god In the plan That he has But it says Through the church God has decided Through the church He's made it known This is the gospel This is the plan Of god And he Empowers the church Therefore To be Co-laborers With him To bring that To pass There was a number Of sacrifices In Pentecost Various things That went on Not nearly as Elaborate as The others But one of Those sacrifices And the The priest In the old Testament did Was they lifted Up two loaves Of leavened bread It's interesting Leavened bread Leavened is a type Of sin And corruption In the scriptures Why would two loaves Of leavened bread Be offered up To the lord At Pentecost Well it's very simple He takes us As we are We're offering Ourselves to him Offer your bodies A living sacrifice Says paul Holy and acceptable Which is a reasonable Service That you might know The will of god Good and acceptable And perfect And faithfully Walk in it Well he takes us As we are We lift ourselves up The 120 weren't perfect But they offered Themselves wholeheartedly To the lord And he accepted That offering And now down Came the The rushing mighty Wind of the love Of god The breath of god Into them Followed by the The tongues of fire That came down And consumed The sacrifice Interesting Psalm Psalm 20 verse 3 That's a very Interesting verse It says May the lord Accept your offerings And literally In the In the hebrew What it says Is may the lord Turn to ashes Your offering Meaning that He just accepts It completely That was the sign That he accepted it And the tongues Mighty tongues Of fire came down To anoint them To have power To proclaim the gospel But also to have That fire within That would consume The sacrifice Of themselves That they were totally Given to the lord So I said that The church came forth And it wanted to To be involved In proclamation Of the gospel Then demonstration Of the gospel But we must not Stop with there It's proclamation Followed by demonstration Followed by participation In the holy life Of the trinity Because that is What God is He's a fellowship And he wants us To share that fellowship And display that fellowship Verse 1 again When the day of Pentecost Had fully come They were of all Of one accord That word One accord Again is so important They were in unity Because that unity Reflected the unity Of the trinity It was a necessity In Latin we have The expression Sine qua non Without which There's nothing Without that unity In verse 1 There would have been Nothing else to do So if we're going To start something If you're going To start a new Business venture Or something You have a product You think is just Going to go in It's going to change Everything You can hire The best engineers And the management Staff and all of that But unless you have Unity You're going to have A problem with The launch of that Product Okay No you don't want Grumpies You don't want Grouchies You don't want Puddleglums To be a part of the Group that you're starting You want a vision You want everybody Excited about the Launch of this project It's the same thing With the church The Lord is going To start the church And he has to do it Perfectly because This church Is going to be Is going to start And it's going to Move successfully From beginning All the way to The end of the age And the consummation Of the Lord's plan The Interesting response Last service But anyway There's a question I'm going to ask That nobody has ever Asked from the pulpit In this church Never ever Well again It was What is Isaac Newton's First law of motion Anybody know Just raise your hand You don't have to say Anything Isaac Newton's First law of motion Someone Yes Say it No No it's not That's the third Law of motion Anyway the first Law of motion Says this If something is at Rest it will remain At rest Unless acted on By an external force That's you parents Raking up your Children in the morning Okay The But the second part Says if something Is in motion It will continue In motion Unless it's acted On by an external Force The idea is the Lord Wanted to start This thing moving And nothing Was going to be Able to stop it All right The gates of hell Would not prevail Against it It would go And it would And it would And it would Succeed in its Mission To bring the gospel To every creature All nations And tribes And tongues And to consummate The plan Of the Lord Not only Was it intended To go It was intended To grow Until like Ezekiel's river Chapter 47 Of Ezekiel A river that Gets wider And deeper As it goes on A little stone In Daniel chapter 2 There's a little stone That gets carved Out of a mountain Without hands And it smashes This giant idol But then the stone Becomes a great mountain And it says It fills all the earth In Isaiah 9 6 You know the verse Unto us a child Is born Unto us a son Is given And the government Shall be upon his shoulder Skipping a little And of the increase Of his government There shall be no end It's a government That increases This little church That begins in Jerusalem Of 120 people As its first congregation Goes on And it is to It is to Cover the earth In glory Ephesians 4 17 Paul says The body of Christ Makes increase Of itself In love As more and more People are joining it So this is the plan So it had to start Right And so it had to start With unity And it had to start In love And it had to start In that In that pattern Of the unity Of the Father Son And the Holy Spirit The Trinitarian unity That they exhibited Would be exhibited Through the church By this shall all men Know that you are My disciples He says If you have love One for another But the implication Is that love You have one for another Is the love That has been That has come down Upon you In the In the In the Father And the Son And the Holy Spirit So there's two Outpourings And I think about That two outpourings In terms of Amos 3 verse 8 Amos 3 verse 8 Says The lion has roared Who shall not fear The Lord has spoken Who shall not prophesy Or preach And so we see The lion has roared As the rushing mighty wind That came down Upon the church And the tongues of fire Tongues speak of speaking And fire speaks of Burning up and consuming That caused them To be filled with the Spirit And start speaking In other tongues And proclaiming The great and mighty Works of the Lord And it's interesting The In the In the ancient synagogues As well as In modern churches There's a lectionary And a lectionary Is a set of readings That the Bible has Or that the Ministers of the Church or synagogue Have to read For every Sabbath And for the reading Or the lectionary Reading for Pentecost In the old In the These are in the Days of Jesus This lectionary They've traced back At least 100 years Before Jesus Is what I've read The reading for Pentecost In the temple Was From Several readings But for the prophets It was Ezekiel chapter 1 Junavi 28 verses I'm not going to read But it says That's filled with fire And lightning And fierce And rapid movements Of the Holy Spirit And so on Very much like What happened at Pentecost But then the rabbis Chose one One more verse From the prophets To read On the Pentecost And that verse Was two chapters Over chapter 3 Of Ezekiel Verse 12 And then it says that And what he says there is Then the Spirit lifted me up And as I turned A voice As of a As of a Great rushing I heard Saying Blessed be the glory Of the Lord From his house And so It would be Presumptuous To say so But a lot of people Think that When the priest Or the Lector Was reading That verse That may have been Just when the Rushing mighty wind Of the Holy Spirit Came down Upon the 120 In that room As I say We don't know But it's But it's Certainly would fit The choreography That I would have placed Okay So it's Rushing mighty wind Followed by The tongue of fire By the way The word tongue of fire Is used in the Old Testament In Isaiah 5 24 Not in the King James But in others That's literally What it says The tongue of fire Consumes the chaff The tongue of fire Came down To consume the offering Of themselves And bring to pass What God's purpose Was for the beginning Of the church Getting it going Getting it growing And becoming An unstoppable force In all of history So I'll close by saying Again In conclusion If you're going to Exhibit the power Of the early church You must first have The unity of the early church And Jesus said that Four times In John 17 He prayed Four times The father That they might be one As thou father Art in me And I in you Pastor Adam Last week Mentioned that In John 14 17 Jesus said The Holy Spirit Has been with you To the disciples But he said He will be What?

In you But you go down Six verses From that To verse 23 Jesus Jesus tells The disciples There He says If Anyone loves me He will keep My words He will guard My words And as a result The father Will love him And we The father And the son Will come And make our Abode with him So we have The fullness Of the trinity Making its abode Making it Remaining with the church Abiding in the church The spirit The father And the son Abiding with the disciples Knitting them together In worship In joy And happiness In the joy And the presence Of the lord Hebrews 2 12 says Jesus is in the midst Of the church In the midst Of the church I will praise thee Oh father That's what he's doing When we come together In that unity For which he prayed And that And that alone Is the trinitarian Witness of Jesus That he is seeking And I think That he promised Or he He Commended Commissioned us for In Acts 1 8 Post Post script Pastor Jim Has been teaching About the trinity For many many years And me Talking with him Recently Thought we'd mention That both he and I Are more than happy To To Talk to you Talk to you About this Most important Somewhat Sometimes obscure Sometimes misunderstood Doctrine It's the It's the doctrine Of the fellowship Of god That the lord Wants to be Emulated with In the life Of the church Shameless Self-promotion I may be teaching A class On the trinity This coming fall So Thank you very much Pastor Joshua Thank you Amen Thank you so much Elliot That was just a great Message for the second time Thanks so much For just being willing To do It's not easy To get up here And speak in front of people Let me say that right now And you just did an amazing job And I learned so much And I will also second that The trinity class Definitely take it Use him And pastor Jim Great resources here At our church At this time We're going to kind of Shift gears Of our service As we celebrate Pentecost today What we're going to do In just a second I'm going to go ahead And invite the team up To give out communion And also anoint you So what's going to happen today We're going to do some anointing If you would like to And what I like about Anointing people We see this with David And how he was anointed But one thing that you could say About anointing That it is sometimes used To set people apart And as the body of Christ As Christians As believers God has set us apart To do the work of the ministry To go out To proclaim The goodness The love The grace Of our Heavenly Father So today I want As I tell you guys To go ahead and stand up real quick You can stand up right now And what we're going to do Is to share in communion As we reflect on Jesus Christ And what he did on the cross For all of our sins And we're also going to be Anointed Because Every single person here God has a plan God has a purpose And God wants to use you In a mighty way But just as I was talking To the high schoolers We have to be obedient To what he tells us Each and every day So what we're going to do right now I'm going to have you go ahead And come down the aisle And we are going to Anoint you And you're going to Take a communion cup And then go back to your seats And then we will Do this all together Amen Amen O to Jesus I surrender I surrender I surrender I surrender I surrender I surrender I surrender I surrender I surrender I surrender I surrender I surrender I surrender to him to him to him I return to him I believe to he to you to you to I handle ��w the to you to you to you to I deliver I surrender all.

I surrender all. All to Thee, my blessed Savior, I surrender all. All to Jesus, I surrender all. Thee at His feet I bow. Worldly pleasures all forsaken take me. Jesus, take me now. I surrender all. I surrender all. All to Thee, my blessed Savior, I surrender all. All to Jesus, I surrender. Make me Savior, holy God. Let me feel the Holy Spirit. Truly know that Thou art mine.

I surrender all. I surrender all. All to Thee, my blessed Savior, I surrender all. I surrender all. I surrender all. I surrender all. I surrender all. I surrender all. I surrender all. I surrender all. I surrender all. I surrender all. I surrender all. I surrender all. I surrender all. I surrender all. I surrender all. I war. I will. I have. I do. I do. I do. I do.

I do. I do. I do. I do. I do. piano plays softly piano plays softly piano plays softly piano plays softly piano plays softly piano plays softly piano plays softly piano plays softly piano plays softly In the same way he took the cup saying, this cup is a new covenant sealed in my blood, shed for you for the forgiveness of sins. Whenever you drink it, do this in remembrance of me.

Let's take the cup. Let's bow our heads in prayer. Let's pray, amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. As we close this service, as we close this service, let us remember on this Pentecost Sunday of what exactly happened, that God anointed the church, the body of Christ, to be the hands and feet of Jesus. And let us not ever forget that at all whatsoever, that God has a plan, he has a purpose for each and every person in this building.

in this building right now. And as we live here today, I want to definitely pray a blessing over every single person. And if you need prayer for anything at all whatsoever, the prayer team will start coming forward right now. We want to pray with you. For I know a lot of us go through some hard things, some hard situations, and sometimes just need someone to come alongside of you as you walk through those trials and those tribulations.

And as the church, we want to make sure that we're here to support. And if you have questions at all whatsoever, no matter what it is, we have our next steps table in the back that we have trained, seasoned Christians who could definitely answer some of those questions. So with that being said, I want to pray a blessing over every person here. so let's bow our heads.

Heavenly Father, we thank you for this day, oh God. We thank you, oh Father God, for the life you have given us all, oh Heavenly King. Continue to bless us, oh Lord God, as we seek your face daily, oh Lord God. I pray for Elliot, Lord God, that you continue to use him in mighty ways, Lord God. I pray for the body of Christ, oh Lord God, that we would know, Father God, that you have set us apart, oh Heavenly Father, to do the work that you have given us all, to make your name known, oh Heavenly King.

Continue to use us in mighty ways, protect us, be ahead of your protection around us, and let us seek your face daily, for we thank you and we praise you. For in Jesus' name we pray, amen. And I know, I know, I know, I know, I know, I know, I know, I know, I know, I know, I know, I know, I know, I know, I know, the one,