Friday, May 24, 2013
Acts 2:16-17 ... this is what was spoken by the prophet Joel: "In the last days, God says, I will pour out my Spirit on all people. ..."
WHAT is THIS?
People are still asking the same questions today of Christians which they asked on that Pentecost: "What is going on here? Why are you saying what you're saying? Why are you doing what you're doing?" Peter stood up to speak, and the eleven stood with him. This was not because preachers usually stood. Rabbis usually sat down to teach. But Peter was speaking with the urgency of a herald, and heralds did not take the time to sit down. The people were asking "What is this?" and Peter seized on their question to announce: THIS is WHAT Joel spoke about when he spoke of the last days. Then Peter went on to quote a whole chapter from the prophet Joel.
How many times from Pentecost on haven't various events reminded people that we are in the last age. At least many earthquakes, wars, and such might have so served us. For Peter announced on Pentecost that we were in the last days. But it was not to terrify us that he pointed this out, but to invite us to the safe shelter of the Rock of Ages. In the shelter of His atonement we will survive the destruction of the world, and the accounting that must follow before the judgment seat of God. "All who call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved!" (Acts 2:21).
The Lord's life and death in our place is the only thing that is good enough to offer to God on that day, the same life and death that won the gift of the Spirit for us.
We now implore God the Holy Ghost
For the true faith, which we need the most,
That in our last moments He may befriend us
And, as homeward we journey, attend us.
Lord, have mercy!
(The Lutheran Hymnal, 231:1)
