Journey to Pentecost

May 19, 2010     Mark 16.20

There those times when you’re doing a job and you really want to work alone.  Too many chiefs and not enough indians can make a job rather difficult and drawn out.   There are those times when partnering in accomplishing tasks is a necessary evil.  For instance I installed some recessed lighting in our kitchen recently.  Due to some restrictions physically for me – I had to get some help.   I asked Josh to help me.  I asked Bill Hall to come and do some wiring for a switch for me.  Together we accomplished the task and with the flick of a switch my kitchen looked like Chicago O’Hare Airport!   I couldn’t have done it without the help.

I absolutely love Mark 16.2 because it is evidence that we are not alone in our work here for the Lord Jesus Christ.  Being alone with Him is much differently than working with Him.  Alone time with Jesus is awesome because it is intimate worship and devotion.  Nothing can replace that time with Him.  But working for the Master is another.  Several principles need to be understood here.

First of all, scripture makes it rather clear here that we can’t accomplish the task of laboring in the field without His affirming Hand working with us.  Second, it highlights the fact that we are “co-laborers” together with Him (1 Corinthians 3.9).   We are laborers with Him.  This means we all hold hands to get kingdom work done.   There are no big i’s and little u’s in the kingdom.  We are laborers together to accomplish the task of taking the world for Christ.

Then there is the issue of the infilling of the Holy Spirit.  Yeah…you know what I’m talking about.  That “tongues” thing again.  But as we have discussed for nearly fifty days, Pentecost is bigger and much more focused than just speaking in tongues.   I used to race cars as a young man.  At the drag strip we would do what is called “burn-outs!”  For the purpose of heating our racing tires up for the run we would hold the car in place and turn the rear wheels.  Smoke and burned rubber would fill the air!  The odor of burning rubber to a race driver is like an expensive bottle of Faberge to woman.  I can smell it now!  Anyway….I digress.   The “evidence” of the burnout was the black rubber laid down on the pavement.   The bigger picture was getting down the drab strip faster than your opponent.  Evidence was necessary to the process but wasn’t the bigger issue.  Tongues is not the issue.  There is a bigger picture painted in Acts than tongues.  Tongues is an evidential principle – not the progressive picture of reaching the ultimate goal of winning people to Christ.  I think you get the picture.

When we read in Acts that the Lord was working with them by confirming the word with signs – it points us to the bigger picture.  What were the signs?  Reading through the book of Acts gives you an indication.   As a matter of fact if you read vss. 17-18 you will get an inside memo on exactly what the Lord wanted out of the early church.   He wanted proactive results that would be hinged to what happened in the upper room.   He had never instructed them is way before.  He had never given them an assigned task quite like this one.   Could it be due to the upper room empowerment?

It is interesting that the word for “following” here is out of the same family as the Holy Spirit’s name “Helper” as recorded in John 14.26; 15.26 and 16.7.   The word means “one who walks along side of; a helper”.   Now when the scripture mentions that the Lord was working with them confirming the word with signs following the implication very well could point to the work of the Holy Spirit assisting them.  Isn’t that the ultimate reason He came?  Isn’t the role of the Holy Spirit to help us get a task accomplished?  Absolutely!  We just don’t want to do His way.  We would rather attempt to get the job done our way.   We really don’t need the supernatural element of evidence by the Holy Spirit in us do we?  

I mentioned in my sermon this past Sunday an illustration.  I used a pocket knife as a gift.  The Holy Spirit’s reference in the book of Acts is the Greek word “dorea” not “charisma” as is in 1 Corinthians 12.   Two different Greek words define two different operations of the Holy Spirit.  One is for enablement to do and the other (1 Corinthians) is for the operation of graces to edify the church – not empowerment.  What if I gave you a pocket knife and said the pocket knife was to open boxes of food set out along Memorial Drive through town?  What if you gave the knife back and said “I’m not comfortable with knives!”   What if you determined you could get the job done just as good without the knife?  What if you gave the knife back and told me you weren’t comfortable with the knife?  Now you know how God probably feels.  As a Father He gave us the gift of the Holy Spirit.  We have determined we’re not comfortable with it….His way.  We think we can get the job done without the gift because we aren’t comfortable with tongues.   Father is offended but we assume He will get over it.  He has not.  He is still working to give us a gift to operate, to carry out His will His way.  We have attempted for nearly 2000 years to get the job done our way.  We have been opening the boxes – no doubt about it.  Opening them has given us the erring opinion that since we opened the boxes we really don’t need the gift of the Holy Spirit.  But the problem is we didn’t open them His way.  We didn’t do it His way.  Remember the Old Testament story of David and Ark of the Covenant (2 Samuel 6)?   Attempts were made to carry the presence of the Lord their way and their way caused problems.   Oh they carried it for a distance…they moved it…but not God’s way.  Under the new covenant of Christ we are sidestepping God’s way and only by His grace do we do what we do without similar results. 

Why not do it His way?  Why not accept the gift of the Holy Spirit His way?  Why try to cheapen the gift or be so offensive with God that we would give it back?   This isn’t the ugly tie from a distant relative who may never know we took the gift back to Kohl’s.  This is a divine enablement to accomplish a destined task.  Doing it His way is so much more powerful.  So much more right in His eyes.  Why would we want to work on our own?  Why can’t we work with Him His way?  Why can’t we accept the gift of the Holy Spirit and not worry about the tongues?  Again, tongues is a manifestation for evidence of personal reception.  That’s all.  Tongues will never save anyone.  Tongues will never heal anyone.  God does that through us just like He speaks through us with His language!  Let Him work with you!