Real Restoration: Acts: “Repent” in Acts 2:38, Part 3 (Spirit, Wrapping Up)

The Spirit

The other element missing from Brandon’s outline is the Spirit. The Holy Spirit is very nearly as much a theme of Peter’s sermon as Jesus.

Peter begins his sermon by declaring that the Spirit is being outpoured as prophesied by Joel. The outpouring of the Spirit means that another promise found in Joel is true —

(Act 2:21 ESV) 21 “‘And it shall come to pass that everyone who calls upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.'”

This promise leads to —

(Act 2:33 ESV)  33 “Being therefore exalted at the right hand of God, and having received from the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, he has poured out this that you yourselves are seeing and hearing.”

You see, the Spirit was first given to Jesus, and then to his disciples. The “promise of the Holy Spirit” is, of course, the outpoured Spirit promised by God through Joel.

(Act 2:38-39 ESV) 38 And Peter said to them, “Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.  39 For the promise is for you and for your children and for all who are far off, everyone whom the Lord our God calls to himself.”

The “gift of the Holy Spirit” is, therefore, the promised Spirit, and “the promise” in v. 39 is the “promise of the Holy Spirit,” which God promised to all generations through the prophets.

Thus, Peter teaches that the Spirit has been outpoured, has been given to Jesus (as attested by his miracles and preaching), and is available to all who are immersed “in the name of King Jesus.” Remember: “Christ” means King.

Conclusion

Our own preaching should be filled with God’s story and the Spirit — along with the other lessons that Brandon and McGarvey rightly find in Peter’s sermon. How would this work?

Well, where are we in God’s story? Jesus has already come, ascended, and founded his church. The Kingdom has already dawned. And yet all outside the church face the same dilemma as Peter’s listeners. Either Jesus was a blasphemer who deserved his crucifixion or else he is Lord of the universe, God’s King, to whom we must bow.

There is no middle ground. He certainly claimed to be the Messiah. Either he was or he wasn’t. And if he is, then our world is turned upside down. “Christ” is not Jesus’ last name, but his title. He is King Jesus, ruler of the universe. He’s not merely an itinerant preacher, a spinner of parables, but the ruler to whom we must submit on penalty of gehenna.

The command to “repent” thus means more than “be nice” or “be moral” or “attend church three times a week.” It means we give our exclusive loyalty to Jesus. He is king and the only king. Indeed, any failure to submit to Jesus is idolatry. “Repent” means that we give up everything for Jesus.

(Luk 9:23-24 ESV)  23 And he said to all, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me.  24 For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will save it.”

(Luk 9:57-62 ESV) 57 As they were going along the road, someone said to him, “I will follow you wherever you go.”  58 And Jesus said to him, “Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.”  59 To another he said, “Follow me.” But he said, “Lord, let me first go and bury my father.”  60 And Jesus said to him, “Leave the dead to bury their own dead. But as for you, go and proclaim the kingdom of God.”  61 Yet another said, “I will follow you, Lord, but let me first say farewell to those at my home.”  62 Jesus said to him, “No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.”

Repentance requires not only a rejection of sin, but an entry into God’s mission. Service to the widow, orphan, and sojourner is necessary because they are near to God’s heart. God cares about them; therefore, we do, too.

But God and Jesus have not abandoned us. The Spirit has come to help transform us into the image of Jesus. He is our Helper, and we need the help. And the coming of the Spirit assures us that God wants us to make it to the end.

God is not a cruel tester, hoping we miss the trick questions. God wants us to pass the test, so much so that he sits next to us and whispers the answers in our ears.

Application

Where am I in God’s story? God is doing great things, but what is my role in God’s mission? To sit on the sidelines and cheer? To send money to his servants? To journal how I feel about God? To memorize his scriptures?

All of those are good things, but they make for boring stories. When your great grandchildren crawl up in your lap and ask, “What did you do in God’s Kingdom?” what will you answer? That you attended church regularly, thanked the preacher for his sermons, and didn’t hurt anyone very much? Boring, boring, boring.

You see, because of our Reformation heritage, we tend to see Christianity in terms of sin and forgiveness — which are part of Christianity but far from the whole of Christianity. That perspective entirely misses God’s mission and our participation in it. Worse yet, when it touches mission, it does so in terms of guilt or patternism — that is,  you’ll go to hell if you don’t evangelize your neighbors or your church isn’t organized according the “pattern” unless it has a benevolence program funded with at least $500. Thus, mission becomes about obligation, burden, and guilt rather than joy, peace, and fulfillment.

The scriptures teach that God is on a redemptive mission and we are called to join it, to participate in it, and in so participating, to be transformed into the very image of God! Oh, wow! God is working in us to return us back to “factory specs,” re-creating us the way we were before we were broken by sin. And surely we’ll much prefer being the way we’re meant to be! And doing mission not only serves God and lives out a life of love, it’s one way in which we’re transformed into God’s image. By the power of the Spirit, we become what we do.

We’re invited to join an ancient community, the Kingdom ruled by Jesus, a polis or city-state in which everyone is part of the same family, in which the King is our older Brother, serving as co-regent with our Father, who loves us.

We become part of a family of many millions — living, dead, and not yet born — who serve together in a common cause. We serve in countless ways from countless perspectives, because God makes us all different and yet needs all our gifts, personalities, and peculiarities to accomplish his ancient, cosmic task.

As Dylan wrote, “you gotta serve somebody,” and who’d you rather serve, a father you loves you or Mammon who wants to destroy you?

It’s a Kingdom, but a Kingdom of redeemed people committed to bringing redemption to the rest of the universe. We all serve that mission in different ways, but we serve in some way. Our funerals should all include the line, “The Kingdom on earth is a little more like it is in heaven because she lived.”

None of this means that the ordinary elements of life are unimportant or not redemptive. No, the point is that the most mundane parts of our lives become redemptive. Raising a family becomes redemptive because we raise our children to be on mission for God — not just to get to heaven but to be ambassadors for Jesus. Our jobs become redemptive because we demonstrate every day how Spirit-transformed people can make the workplace and our customers and clients better for having dealt with us.

Our free time becomes redemptive because we serve God in our hobbies and recreation. Rather than playing church league ball to escape the ugliness of the world, we play in a secular league to show what Christ-centered sportsmanship and competition looks like.

When we volunteer at church, it’s not to soothe our guilty conscience but to help God transform his children to be more Christ-like. Sometimes it requires a loving confrontation. Sometimes it requires a hand up. It never requires competition or rivalry.

Our preaching changes. Rather than looking for more and more positions to be right on so we can feel superior to the church down the road, preaching is designed to conform us to the gospel, so that we become more and more like Jesus every day — more servant-hearted, more submissive, more willing to sacrifice. Our preaching is therefore Christ-centered.

Grace matures beyond celebrating our escape from sin to motivation to bring others into grace. We become gracious people, slow to judge, and quick to forgive. We become people who quickly forget past wrongs and give one another a clean slate every day.

Our focus therefore shifts from obscure inferences to the obviously central passages: the Sermon on the Mount, 1 Corinthians 13, and Romans 12.

We learn to think in terms of relationship rather than rules. Yes, there are boundaries, and they are very important, but our focus isn’t so much on sharpening the edges of boundaries as learning how to live joyously within the boundaries — so that others are compelled to come in. Boundaries aren’t so much to be defended as expanded. Indeed, the goal is to have the entire world within the boundaries of the Kingdom. Our hunker-down, bunker mentality is transformed to a war of conquest — with the only weapons being faith, hope, and most especially love.

As we become more and more like God, our hearts ache for the unfortunate. We learn to sympathize with human weakness. We learn to see government, politics, and power from God’s perspective — as tools designed as means of love that have become corrupted into tools that serve themselves. We are thereby enabled to recognize the dangers of nationalism and partisan politics, and to judge such things from the perspective of God’s mission rather than what gives “our side” power.

On the other hand, we recognize that compassion for the poor is for the poor indeed.

(2Th 3:10 ESV) 10 For even when we were with you, we would give you this command: If anyone is not willing to work, let him not eat.

We learn that the goal isn’t self-sufficiency, but being needed by others —

(Eph 4:28 ESV) 28 Let the thief no longer steal, but rather let him labor, doing honest work with his own hands, so that he may have something to share with anyone in need.

And maybe it comes down to this: Not everyone can be famous or a great teacher or leader. Not everyone can found an astonishing ministry that serves thousands. But everyone can be needed.