Today Our Daily Bread Acts 2 & John 1:14

Scripture selections are taken from the Rock Church Daily Bread Reading schedule for each month. “Lena’s Journalin’” are Lena’s comments on the specific passages from her Daily Journal.

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Acts 2:1-47
The Holy Spirit Comes
1On the day of Pentecost, seven weeks after Jesus' resurrection, F6 the believers were meeting together in one place. 2Suddenly, there was a sound from heaven like the roaring of a mighty windstorm in the skies above them, and it filled the house where they were meeting. 3Then, what looked like flames or tongues of fire appeared and settled on each of them. 4And everyone present was filled with the Holy Spirit and began speaking in other languages, F7 as the Holy Spirit gave them this ability.
5Godly Jews from many nations were living in Jerusalem at that time. 6When they heard this sound, they came running to see what it was all about, and they were bewildered to hear their own languages being spoken by the believers.
7They were beside themselves with wonder. "How can this be?" they exclaimed. "These people are all from Galilee, 8and yet we hear them speaking the languages of the lands where we were born! 9Here we are—Parthians, Medes, Elamites, people from Mesopotamia, Judea, Cappadocia, Pontus, the province of Asia, 10Phrygia, Pamphylia, Egypt, and the areas of Libya toward Cyrene, visitors from Rome (both Jews and converts to Judaism), 11Cretans, and Arabians. And we all hear these people speaking in our own languages about the wonderful things God has done!" 12They stood there amazed and perplexed. "What can this mean?" they asked each other. 13But others in the crowd were mocking. "They're drunk, that's all!" they said.
Peter Preaches to a Crowd
14Then Peter stepped forward with the eleven other apostles and shouted to the crowd, "Listen carefully, all of you, fellow Jews and residents of Jerusalem! Make no mistake about this. 15Some of you are saying these people are drunk. It isn't true! It's much too early for that. People don't get drunk by nine o'clock in the morning. 16No, what you see this morning was predicted centuries ago by the prophet Joel:
17 'In the last days, God said, I will pour out my Spirit upon all people. Your sons and daughters will prophesy, your young men will see visions, and your old men will dream dreams.
18 In those days I will pour out my Spirit upon all my servants, men and women alike, and they will prophesy.
19 And I will cause wonders in the heavens above and signs on the earth below— blood and fire and clouds of smoke.
20 The sun will be turned into darkness, and the moon will turn bloodred, before that great and glorious day of the Lord arrives.
21 And anyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.' F8
22"People of Israel, listen! God publicly endorsed Jesus of Nazareth by doing wonderful miracles, wonders, and signs through him, as you well know. 23But you followed God's prearranged plan. With the help of lawless Gentiles, you nailed him to the cross and murdered him. 24However, God released him from the horrors of death and raised him back to life again, for death could not keep him in its grip. 25King David said this about him:
'I know the Lord is always with me. I will not be shaken, for he is right beside me.
26 No wonder my heart is filled with joy, and my mouth shouts his praises! My body rests in hope.
27 For you will not leave my soul among the dead F9 or allow your Holy One to rot in the grave.
28 You have shown me the way of life, and you will give me wonderful joy in your presence.' F10
29"Dear brothers, think about this! David wasn't referring to himself when he spoke these words I have quoted, for he died and was buried, and his tomb is still here among us. 30But he was a prophet, and he knew God had promised with an oath that one of David's own descendants would sit on David's throne as the Messiah. 31David was looking into the future and predicting the Messiah's resurrection. He was saying that the Messiah would not be left among the dead and that his body would not rot in the grave.
32"This prophecy was speaking of Jesus, whom God raised from the dead, and we all are witnesses of this. 33Now he sits on the throne of highest honor in heaven, at God's right hand. And the Father, as he had promised, gave him the Holy Spirit to pour out upon us, just as you see and hear today. 34For David himself never ascended into heaven, yet he said,
'The LORD said to my Lord, Sit in honor at my right hand
35 until I humble your enemies, making them a footstool under your feet.' F11
36So let it be clearly known by everyone in Israel that God has made this Jesus whom you crucified to be both Lord and Messiah!"
37Peter's words convicted them deeply, and they said to him and to the other apostles, "Brothers, what should we do?"
38Peter replied, "Each of you must turn from your sins and turn to God, and be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. Then you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. 39This promise is to you and to your children, and even to the Gentiles F12 —all who have been called by the Lord our God." 40Then Peter continued preaching for a long time, strongly urging all his listeners, "Save yourselves from this generation that has gone astray!"
41Those who believed what Peter said were baptized and added to the church—about three thousand in all. 42They joined with the other believers and devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and fellowship, sharing in the Lord's Supper and in prayer.
The Believers Meet Together
43A deep sense of awe came over them all, and the apostles performed many miraculous signs and wonders. 44And all the believers met together constantly and shared everything they had. 45They sold their possessions and shared the proceeds with those in need. 46They worshiped together at the Temple each day, met in homes for the Lord's Supper, and shared their meals with great joy and generosity—47all the while praising God and enjoying the goodwill of all the people. And each day the Lord added to their group those who were being saved.
FOOTNOTES:F6: Greek When the day of Pentecost arrived. This annual celebration came 50 days after the Passover ceremonies. See Lev 23:16. F7: Or in other tongues. F8: Joel 2:28-32. F9: Greek in Hades; also in 2:31. F10: Ps 16:8-11. F11: Ps 110:1. F12: Greek to those far away.
~Lena’s Journalin’~
7 means perfection, completion.
Jesus said , “It is completed”
He prophesied that we’d all receive the work that he “completed”. He asked the disciples to wait and receive this part of the whole thing, Jesus paid for,
7 x 7 = 49, Jesus was with them for 40 days after the resurrection! THEN 9 days later, His Spirit came and offered Himself to man, as empowerment for the mission to accomplish! WOW. That really was not that long of a wait, now was it? He’d thoroughly prepared them to meet the part of God that had dwelled inside of Him and now was going to be offered to them as well.
Do you remember another 49 in the NT? It was where Jesus told us that we have to forgive others, as many times as needed. We needed to forgive them completely. Loose them and let them go free of our unforgivness or bitterness which we hold them captive to, or want to make them responsible to.
I just saw something here. I saw that inside of the crowd there were those who were impressed with the act of God that was happening in the church, being sen by those in the world, and there was another section that was not impressed at all and would not be impressed. They made up excuses for the act of God, they explained it away. Which are we? Those who disregard His work or those who with joy receive and accept it? Do we explain the works of God in the churches and among Christians we know as just ordinary abuses and craziness? I can tell you, the naturally born persons that we are want to explain God away and disregard the things of God as natural fleuks of life. We need to be oh so careful of that kind of thinking, it works against God and faith in God. It is our mature adult responsibility to embrace the things of God., to take responsibility to believe God, to receive His promises that he gave us even when we did not ask for them. We are responsible to join ourselves to a body of believers as a family. It is our decisions and the exercise of our freewill’s to devote ourselves to the things of God or not. At the age of even 20, I believe in the good ol’ USA, there will be no excuse whatsoever to now get to know Jesus. We need to often take our thoughts towards eternity and even judgment with Christ. He paid for us to have free access to all of this, all of His empowerment, all of His will, purpose and participation in His eternal plans for the earth. He will ask us, what did you do with the death and resurrection of My Son? We will have no excuses. Not one.he will ask us why we did not become a functioning part of a Christian body of believers where we lived, we wil have no excuse. We won’t be able to say, “we don’t like people”, or “people hurt us”. He gave us tools to combat these things, empowerment by his spirit to do these things and to build relationships and bring change He told us the two greatest commandments are to Love God with everything, AND to love people. There is now and ever will be no excuse. Let’s remove them now, let’s trust God now, Let’s receive Him and His co-mission. Let’s go as he said, with the empowerment of His mighty awesome sprit. The same spirit that raised Christ from the dead and gave us new life! Let’s eliminate the excuses and go ALL the WAY with God! It’s almost a New Year. Why do we get new days, weeks and years? To have another chance to make that decision and press on in the ones we’ve made.

Let's allow the WORD of God to be made flesh among us, who we are individually as people, allow it to become who we are, made One with God's word as jesus so greatly demonstrated for us. His word can become human in us also, if we allow it to be so. We either believe and live it or we don't and live it! Can the world see His glory in us? Yes they can, but that is totally up to us.
John 1:14 So the Word became human and lived here on earth among us. He was full of unfailing love and faithfulness. F1 And we have seen his glory, the glory of the only Son of the Father.