Introduction
Every year, the church prayerfully participates in the 10 days following Jesus’ ascension. During that time, the disciples awaited the promised gift of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost. Now, we learn to wait with them, longing for the Spirit’s renewing work and tracing a pattern in Scripture: God ascends to reign and fills people with the Holy Spirit so they can rule with him.
We have seen the Holy Spirit reverse the rival filling of rebellious spirits by empowering Jesus’ disciples. We have seen Jesus undo the rival ascension of Babel by sharing his heavenly enthronement with his people. The message of Jesus' Kingship is proclaimed in every language of every nation gathered in Jerusalem, and Peter explains that these signs show that the King’s rule in and through humanity has begun. Now, we will see the nations enter Jesus’ worldwide Kingdom as they respond to Peter’s proclamation.
Repent and Be Baptized
Peter has just explained to the crowd that the Spirit poured out is the sign that Jesus sits on the highest throne at God’s right hand. As King, he has come to visit his people, the very ones who rejected and crucified him. Acts says the people are cut to the heart as they realize their complicity in the greatest crime of rebellion against God: killing God himself. They ask Peter what they must do, now that they have heard that Jesus has ascended as King (Acts 2:37).
Peter responds with the doorway into the Kingdom: “Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ” (Acts 2:38). To repent is to renounce rival kingdoms and submit to Jesus’ rule. To be baptized is to renounce rival rulers and enter into Jesus’ Spirit-filled life by being formed into his image as true sons and daughters of God. Back in Genesis, God covered the world in water to wash it clean of the giants. In Exodus, God’s people passed through the sea when God freed them from slavery. Now, with the news that Jesus has rescued humanity from its ancient slavery to rebellious powers, we are invited to pass through the waters of baptism and be filled with the Holy Spirit.
The Gift of the Spirit
Peter tells the crowd that, through repentance and baptism, they will receive forgiveness and the gift of the Holy Spirit (Acts 2:38). As humans receive the Holy Spirit, they are remade into true images of God who reign with Jesus, the enthroned Son of God. This promise, as Peter says, is not just for those gathered at Jerusalem on the first Pentecost, but for every generation, near and far (Acts 2:39).
Join Their Life
The group of 120 who experienced Pentecost swelled to 3000 Jesus-followers that day (Acts 2:41). And through the church, Jesus’ Spirit-empowered body on earth, the Kingdom of God has grown and pushed back rival kingdoms and rival rulers in every generation since. And God still invites his people into the work he began that day. He fills us with his Spirit and invites us to join his Kingdom. We enter through the door proclaimed at Pentecost: “Repent and be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ” (Acts 2:38).
Even though humanity once rejected God’s Kingdom purpose, Jesus—the risen and ascended King—offers forgiveness to all who repent, and the Father pours out the Spirit on all who are baptized. In this way, we enter the Kingdom of God and join Jesus in pushing back the powers that seek to deform us and draw us away from our calling to fill the earth with his life and likeness. Filled with the Holy Spirit, we are formed more and more into God’s image as we spread the Kingdom of the ascended Son of God, awaiting the day he returns, when the whole earth will be filled with his flourishing life.
Guided Prayer
We respond to Jesus’ Ascension to the throne of God and the Holy Spirit’s filling of people at Pentecost with the words of Psalm 8:
O LORD our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth!
You have set your glory above the heavens.
From the lips of children and infants, you have ordained praise
Because of your enemies, silence the foe and the avenger.
When I consider the heavens, the work of your fingers;
The moon and stars which you have set in place,
What is man that you are mindful of him, the son of man that you care for him?
You made him a little lower than the heavenly beings
And have crowned him with glory and honor
You made him ruler over the works of your hands, you put everything under his feet.
All flocks and herds and the beasts of the field,
The birds of the air and the fish of the sea, all that swim in the paths of the seas.
O LORD, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth!