Acts 2:5-13
October 14, 2001
The Gospel Plainly Proclaimed
As our culture becomes more complex there is the pressing need to simplify, to take the enigmatic and make it elementary. We all need at one time or another, the cookies placed on the lower shelf. One avenue to make the abstract accessible is found in the popular books for Dummies and the Complete Idiot’s Guides. There is a Taxes for Dummies, Auto Repair, and Theology for Dummies. I even saw a Complete Idiot’s Guide to Middle East Conflict. While these books are useful, I would worry if I saw my surgeon leafing through the pages of Brain Surgery for Dummies as I was wheeled into the O.R.
Earlier in the service we heard Genesis 11, of the Tower of Babel and the confusion of languages created by God to keep humanity from believing the lie that they can reach God a part from God reaching down to them. The world in which we live today is still affected by that curse. Not only do we suffer from an inability to grasp the complex, unable to do our taxes, fix our car or do brain surgery … we are also cut off from so many people in our world. The conflict in which we are now engaged certain in our world stems in part from the cultural divisions described in Genesis 11.
What is the affect of the gospel in a world of diversity and division? What should we expect when the Holy Spirit comes into the lives of God’s people, in the church? What is the effect of the Spirit of God at work in the people of God? The coming of the Spirit at Pentecost gives us an insight into what God has done, what God will do in our world.
First, we need to review and see why Pentecost was important:
- It was an agricultural festival. It marked the beginning of grain harvest, coming 50 days after Feast of Unleavened Bread and the presentation of the first fruits of the early harvest. As the people celebrated the beginning of the grain harvest, the church was about to begin the great harvest of new believers, a harvest which has gone on now for 2000 years.
- It was, by the first century, most likely also a theological holy day. The rabbis inferred from Exodus 19 that the agricultural feast fell on the same day when the Law was delivered from Sinai. The coming of the Spirit at this time marked the power by which the Law could be kept. For centuries God’s people longed for the day when God would give his grace to his people to respond to his commands. The Holy Spirit’s coming on this day draws together the important truth that the Law of God can only be kept by God’s power at work in God’s people.
The events of that day were also important. There are two signs we saw last week.
- While the believers had gathered in one place the sound of rushing wind caught their attention. As we saw last week, the connection of Spirit and wind was well understood by the early believers. Throughout the Old Testament the work of the Spirit in both creation and redemption was equated with wind or breath. The sound of wind at Pentecost was a confirmation that God was about to move making those who were spiritually dead come to new life.
- The second sign was also connected to the work of God the Spirit. The tongues of fire which rested on each believer was a sign of God’s presence, of his holiness and the ensuing judgment of those who refused to see their sin and God’s only solution to that sin. This fire is described by the symbol of tongues, a sign for what is to follow next. That which seemed to be tongues of fire would be realized in the fiery speech which was soon to come. The Spirit fills the believers who then speak. Let’s take a look at what that filling entails. Read Acts 2:1-13
Before we delve into the text, we need to know who are the characters in this chapter.
As we’ve already seen, the believers are gathered in a room, either the upper room of chapter one or at some spot in the temple. But when the Spirit comes, others are then mentioned. In v5 we are introduced to the audience who will witness the effects of the coming Spirit.
These are pious Jews, pilgrims who have come for the festival in Jerusalem. Luke says that they were “staying” there. This term is often used of residency, not visiting. These worshippers who had gathered, may well have come not just for the feast, but now resided in Jerusalem.
In 2:9-11 we are given a listing of their places of origin. It is important to remember that for some six hundred years Jews had been dispersed through a variety of conquests of ancient Israel. The Jews of the Diaspora had settled throughout the known world. Luke gives a list which generally moves from the east to the west, covering not every spot, but serves as a sampling of the places Jews had already settled.
These two groups, the disciples and the Jews from around the world come together in v6. The crowd in the Temple, awaiting the festivities of Pentecost, hear a sound. They are bewildered by what they hear – these new believers are speaking in “other tongues”. The main point of this supernatural work of God’s grace is that the gospel is now proclaimed clearly.
To say that the Holy Spirit makes his presence clear through tongues seems like an oxymoron to us today. For the issue of speaking in tongues far from clear for many Christians, far from an emboldening event and certainly not an issue which unites. In order to understand what is happening here we need to ask some important questions, recognizing however, that I will not answer all the issues this morning nor if I had a hundred mornings would I make everyone here satisfied. What are the tongues Luke refers to here? Three common options.
The Holy Spirit produces the miracle of ecstatic languages
This view looks at the glossolalia mentioned in 1 Corinthians 12-14 and from that reads back into Acts. While what is described by Paul in his letter to Corinth is more clear than the brief references here, to do this is to ignore what Luke says. The languages here are not ecstatic tongues or heavenly languages. What is more, there are some notable differences between Acts 2 and 1 Corinthians 12-14
- The tongues mentioned in these two passages are different in direction. In Acts the tongues are for publicly declaring (11) of God’s wonders, sharing them with others, while in 1 Corinthians the tongue speaker does not speak to men but to God.
- Secondly, they are different in character. Here in Acts what is said is being understood by those who hear, while in 1 Corinthians the speech was unintelligible and an interpreter was necessary.
- Thirdly, they are different in purpose. In Acts it seems to be evidential, an initial sign given to all, bearing witness to their reception of the Spirit while in 1 Corinthians it is for edification, a gift bestowed on some for the building up of the church. (from Stott, Acts)
The Holy Spirit produces the miracle of hearing
Some conclude that the miracle here is not ecstatic speech but that when the disciples spoke, the people heard their own language. It is not so much speaking in tongues as it is hearing their own tongues spoken. For this, people will point to v11, that the people were amazed that they heard them declaring the wonders of God in their own tongues. Secondly, there are multiple languages, so when Peter speaks in v14, it was the people who heard a variety of languages. The difficulty with this is that it does not take seriously v4,6. The focus is on speech, on tongues, not the hearing.
The Holy Spirit produces the miracle of speaking in languages which one does not know
The interpretation of Acts 2 most widely held throughout Christian history is the “language miracle interpretation”. According to this scenario, when the disciples used "other tongues" they were supernaturally speaking languages they had never learned. Proponents of this view assume first, the crowd of Acts 2 spoke many different native languages and secondly, the disciples were unable to speak these native languages (thus requiring a language miracle).
For this reason vv6,8,11 make the point that what the people hear is a language to which they are accustomed to hear from their native lands. The people are amazed to hear words spoken in a familiar language. Each of the disciples is so gifted to express the gospel in a variety of languages.
This view misses some important facts and thereby, I believe, misses the point of what is described. The list is geo-political rather than linguistic distinctions. Whether there were languages particular to those regions, the languages which those Jews in those regions were not as diverse as we might think.
There is no Mesopotamian language, but the common language from that region is Aramaic, the language the Apostles would know most intimately. Judea is listed as a place, but again, what miracle would it be for the Galileans to speak their mother tongue. Greek was the primary language of Egypt and the Cyrenian language was Greek as well.
Remember, the vast majority of those present were from Palestine. For them there would be no miracle of tongues, but just proclamation of the gospel in their own language. If an international conference were held in Milwaukee, it should come as no surprise that most of those attending would be from the Midwest. So with Pentecost, most would not be shocked to hear the Galileans speak their normal language. There is no miracle in that.
At the outset of this event, Luke describes the people hearing many people speak and they understand. But beginning in 2:14 Peter speaks to the crowd and they understand him. If the miracle is not that of hearing, what would Peter have said which would have been understood by all?
The fact is that Jews around the world spoke Aramaic or Greek (or both) and quite possibly Latin as well. The Jews of the Diaspora were almost entirely city dwellers and would be quite conversant in the same languages which were known in first century Palestine. Peter, as a Galilean, would know both tongues, as many of his neighbors in his region were Gentiles.
Finally, would speaking in another language give rise to the accusation of drunkenness in v13? If they are merely speaking languages they do not know, that final response makes little sense. Drunkenness does not impart the ability to speak unlearned languages; it decreases verbal ability and frequently causes speech to become slurred.
There is another option which is no less miraculous and which makes what happened here much more applicable to the church throughout the ages.
The Holy Spirit produces the miracles of bold proclamation of the gospel
Simply stated, what happened to the Christians in Jerusalem on Pentecost was that when filled with the Holy Spirit, they spoke the Gospel so that people clearly understood the claims of Christ on their lives. What this means is that Peter and the other believers spoke Greek and Aramaic and the people were amazed. This explanation in no way diminishes the miraculous work of the Holy Spirit in the lives of the early church, rather it reinforces the necessity of God to be at work in us in the life changing presentation of the gospel to our world. Two critical questions result from this view.
First, why would Luke describe the Aramaic and Greek languages (languages familiar to the disciples/speakers) as "other tongues"? Other than what language?
In the first century Jews commonly spoke at least two languages, but worshipped in another. Hebrew was the language of the Temple, of worship. The Mishnah refers to the Hebrew language as leshon ha-kodesh (the holy tongue) to distinguish it from the Aramaic vernacular or other "secular tongues" spoken by the Jewish people. It was believed that Hebrew is God's language in which he gave the Torah. But Hebrew was not the language of the household, of the street.
In first century Palestine, there was the lingua franca, the trade language used to survive in a diverse world. Some of you may have spoken another language at home but English with outsiders. While this may have been the case, Hebrew fits another linguistic category, diaglossia.
Diglossia is the development of two different languages among a common people for two different purposes, often regulated by social conventions. In most cases, one language is spoken in ordinary everyday life by everybody, and the other is employed in formal speech, on formal occasions, in writing, in religious activities, and the like. Diglossia situations are extremely common, existing in many countries as between local dialect and standard educated language. In a diglossia, too, not everyone is able to handle the upper language. In most cases. it is imparted by some process of formal education.
The best known religious diglossia in America would be the use of Latin in pre-Vatican II Roman Catholicism. The religious and scholarly language of Catholicism for centuries was Latin. Latin served as the formal language of the diglossia, while German, French, etc., were the vernacular languages. Tyndale was killed for violating the ecclesiastical diglossia in 16th century England.
The second question then is “why would the crowd react with amazement (v6,7,12) and ridicule (v13) when they heard the speakers proclaiming in Aramaic and Greek (languages the disciples already knew)?
If a diglossia existed among first-century Judeans, we may have a clue about the interpretation of the phrase other tongues in Acts 2:4. Among first-century Judeans the religious language, Hebrew, was the language that both Palestinian and Diaspora Jews expected to hear in the Temple liturgy during the feast of Pentecost.
The crowd (the holy people of God/"devout men" v 5) had gathered in Jerusalem (the holy city), at the Temple (the holiest place on earth), expecting trained priests (the holy men) to be conducting the liturgy in Hebrew on a holy day. Instead, the disciples of Jesus began to prophesy in "other tongues" with a boldness and authority given by the Holy Spirit.
In the Temple precincts, Hebrew was the language. To use any other would, Greek or Aramaic, would be another tongue, a language which is fine in the home or workshop, but not in worship. What would be the response of devout, God-fearing Jews ready to celebrate the Passover? They would certainly be amazed. What is more, some would see this act as impertinent, perhaps even a sign that these early Christians had a bit too much wine and with loosened inhibitions, they forgot proper decorum.
This passage teaches us that when God set out to change the world, he did so through the simple and powerful proclamation of the death, burial and resurrection of Christ. It was not couched in a language, while beautiful, was reserved for special occasions. It was the street language, the vernacular. The effective preaching of the gospel in clear language of our culture is the means by which we challenge our world. This preaching must be by the power of the Holy Spirit giving utterance, empowerment (v4).
This word refers to the kind of authoritative, weighty, important speech characteristic of a prophet or similarly inspired person. The word occurs only three times in the New Testament: Acts 2:4,14; 26:25. In Acts 2:14 Peter stands up and speaks out to the crowd ("raised his voice and 'declared' to them"). Peter is not given a new language in 2:14; instead, his speech is described as bold, authoritative, and inspired by the Spirit. In Acts 26 Paul gives his defense before Agrippa, saying “I 'utter' words of sober truth." The emphasis is on Paul's manner of speaking.
We are called upon to boldly proclaim God’s truth to our world. We do so not in our own strength or power, but by the work of the Spirit of God. This should give us tremendous confidence. This was at the heart of the Reformation 500 years ago. Then the church, seeing the need for maintaining a language for worship and another for everyday life, responded with amazement and threats when the preaching in the churches turned to the speech understandable by the common man and woman. Today we can speak with confidence that God will honor his Word, that we can rest in Christ to work through the Spirit to honor the Word.
This powerful, plain, effective preaching of the gospel transcends culture
Pentecost teaches us that the Church's task isn't to unite the world in one language. Our job is not to teach everyone English. Our task is to preach Jesus to the nations in their own language.
The curse of Babel is not reversed, but transcended by God’s grace. God’s anger at Babel was the self determination, the desire to stand before God in their own righteousness. The curse of cultural diversity is one against trying to achieve heaven without God.
Now diverse people are re-united not in a common human culture, but by a common Spirit.
America, with its melting pot reputation, its mongrelization of the world’s ethnic groups has had an oddly isolationistic attitude for... 200 years. Last month changed much of that. We are no longer an island to ourselves, expecting people to come to us, love us, welcome us and take their part in adopting the American Dream. September 11th and the now ensuing conflict in Afghanistan and throughout the world forces a change in the way we view the world. One important lens through which we should examine our contemporary problems is through the lens of Acts 2.
The universal nature of the gospel presentation should be an encouragement to us that a bold proclamation of Christ’s atoning death, Christ’s propitious sacrifice is not just a western truth, an Anglo gospel. Rather the power of the Spirit crosses ethic, linguistic, cultural boundaries. We must never be ashamed of the truth of the gospel as though it were not culturally correct. Our great challenge as Christians today is to not fall prey to the temptation to see those unlike us as an enemy, but people who need to hear the gospel in their own tongue.
(I owe much of this in both thought and direct quote to R. Zerhusen’s A New Look at Tongues, which can be found at www.alliancenet.org/pub/articles/zerhusen.tongues1.Acts.html)
