Day 322 – Peter – Pentecost

• Lots of interesting things to talk about today. Acts 2 describes an event called Pentecost. I expect that’s one of those “Christian words” you’ve possibly heard of, but probably couldn’t explain! Well… can you now?
• Pentecost was originally a festival, celebrated yearly at harvest time, but we now use the word to refer to this specific event. What supernatural event occurred?
• You will have heard about “speaking in tongues” before. It’s often misunderstood. Look at Acts 2:6. In this specific instance, the phenomemon allowed people to hear all the other languages in their own language. It must have been astonishing! Look at the list of countries who could understand what was being said.
• The people were described as being “filled with the Holy Spirit”. We believe as Christians we can, too, be filled with the Spirit. The Bible talks about us receiving the Holy Spirit when we come to Jesus, so what do you think the difference  (if there is one) of being “filled” in this way?
• 1 Corinthians 12-14 talks a lot about speaking in tongues. What’s the main message that Paul is sharing with his readers in the verses we read today?
• Did Paul say that speaking in tongues is good? What does he say could be better? In what situations could speaking in tongues be a harmful thing?
• The obvious question you may be wondering about is whether speaking in tongues is something that still happens nowadays. Well – that’s a subject of much debate. The teaching at some churches might say no, and point to 1 Corinthians 13:8, or verses like that. They would say it was a gift only for the early church. Other churches and individuals, including people I know well, would say this “gift” is still used, although perhaps more rarely. That’s a debate for another day. What’s important to remember now is that it isn’t one of the most critical points of doctrine, and that speaking in tongues doesn’t make someone a better Christian, or “more filled” with the Spirit.
• The rest of Acts 2 gives us Peter’s brave speech to the people at Pentecost. We’ve touched on these words before in this study. He referenced the passage in Joel regarding speaking in tongues, talked about Jesus being the Promised Messiah, and ended with a call to “repent and be baptised”. Could you share the gospel confidently with your friends like Peter does here?
• How many become followers of Jesus on that day? What was their response in the way they lived for God and with each other?

I once visited to a church which wasn’t my regular one. I was about 12 years old. Things were very different to what I was used to! People got up and danced around, and there was lots more congregation participation. There were times during the service where we prayed about very specific physical needs and people saw healing at that time. On a second visit I experienced people speaking in tongues.

Now’s not the moment to debate the rights and wrongs of anything that happened at that church, or the way they conducted their services. Perhaps some of it was “better” than how my church does it, perhaps “worse”, if indeed you can even use such words. We can only base what a church chooses to do on whether it is biblical though, not on personal preference. I found the speaking in tongues and healing to be exciting but confusing. It was different to what I knew, which made it a bit scary. It helped me consider what a non-Christian might feel when first walking into a church. It did teach me, however, to be open to how people understand biblical teaching. Different didn’t always mean wrong!

As long as the the Bible is preached, and the Word in it is preached faithfully and without an agenda, then that’s a good starting point. If, through that teaching, a church comes to a particular conclusion on topics such as spiritual gifts, or speaking in tongues, or the way the Holy Spirit operates, then fine. If that church is making decisions based on other things, such as personal feelings or the culture of the world, then that’s not always helpful.