The book of Acts, which was written by Luke the historian, is the account of the explosive early Christian movement. Acts is more than just a historical account of the church’s early growth, it is also an inspired analysis of the dynamics of corporate spiritual renewal.
“Spiritual renewal” is the term that followers of Jesus often use to describe what happens when God pours out His Spirit on His people, when He is free to work powerfully in and through His people to show the world how real, mighty, and good Jesus is. This is what Jesus promised His followers in Acts 1:8, when He promised His disciples that they would receive exactly what they would need to minister to all corners of the earth. In short, “spiritual renewal” simply means “when the church is the way God intends it to be” rather than the sterile and spiritually inadequate way it often is.
Why focus on this theme? Not to feel good and criticize other churches; rather, because there is a deep need for spiritual renewal. I am praying that as we look at this inspired record of the early Christian movement, God will stir our hearts and open our eyes to what He wants to do in and through us, and that He will pour out His Spirit on us.
While there was renewal during Old Testament times, the first spiritual renewal among Christians occurred a few days after Jesus uttered His words in Acts 1:8.
Read Acts 2:1-4. The day of Pentecost is the final spring festival, thanking God for the beginning of the agricultural harvest. This was a fitting day for God to pour out His Spirit on Jesus’ followers, because this resulted in the beginning of a great spiritual harvest. As the 120 gathered together, God granted them an unmistakable spiritual experience accompanied by three extraordinary phenomena:
They heard a roar like a loud windstorm, and they saw something like flames of fire settling on each one of them. As Jews, they would know that these phenomena sometimes occurred in the Old Testament during manifestations of God (see Ezekiel 37 and Exodus 3). In this way, God made clear to them externally what they were experiencing internally — that His Spirit had come to indwell them with His powerful and loving presence, just as Jesus had promised (see John 14:18-21 and 23 and Romans 5:5).
Naturally, they began to speak about and praise God for His mighty acts, such as their salvation through Jesus’ death and resurrections (Acts 2:11); but the Spirit enabled them to speak this in human languages they had never learned. Why? For the sake of others who were arriving for the festival from different parts of the world.
Read Acts 2:5-13. Thousands of Jewish pilgrims from all over the Roman Empire were in Jerusalem for the spring festivals. While these people all spoke Greek, the common Empire language, they spoke many different native languages. Drawn to the Christian meeting by the sound of the “wind,” they were amazed to hear these Galileans, who were known to be uneducated locals, speaking flawlessly to them in their native language about Jesus! Most of them realized that this was God at work, and asked for a further explanation. In the following verses, Peter explained the message of Jesus as God’s promised Messiah, His death and resurrection for their sins, the offer of forgiveness, and the Holy Spirit for them if they humbly received Jesus’ forgiveness. 3000 of these pilgrims responded to Peter’s invitation, and the Christian movement erupted!
It is unfortunate that many Christians, often called “Pentecostals”, mistakenly teach that speaking in tongues is a universal element of spiritual renewal. As we read on in Acts, we will see that two other renewed groups speak in tongues, but many others do not. We do find in Acts, and the New Testament letters, that there are at least four elements in this event that are universal spiritual renewals. These are not the only universal elements, but they are very important. Let’s identify them and more importantly, ask ourselves: “Can we relate to this?”
Not just private prayer; they came together to pray as a group. Not just occasional, perfunctory corporate prayer; they were constantly praying together. Not random prayers for individualistic desires; they were united and with one mind, praying about the same priorities — praise to Jesus and gratitude for their salvation, commitment to Jesus’ mission, and dependence on Jesus’ promise of the Spirit.
Luke is careful throughout the book of Acts to document the connection between this kind of prayer and the work of God’s Spirit in and through His church; there are 18 references to prayer — 14 corporate and four individual, (see especially 1:14; 2:1 and 42; 3:1; 4:24-31; 6:4; 12:5,12; 13:2-3).
Why is this always connected to spiritual renewal? Because only God can renew us, and because the main way we express our need for His renewal and confidence that He will renew us is through this kind of kingdom-centered prayer! That is why Jesus said Luke 11:9-13. That is why Paul said Colossians 4:2.
In his book Prayer, Tim Keller writes, “Renewals usually start with a very small group of people — sometimes just one person — who begin to pray for God’s glory in the community. Usually it is just a handful of people; always it is some kind of ‘extraordinary’ prayer beyond the normal services and patterns of prayer.”
Keller goes on to write about a man in New York from the 1800’s who decided to hold a prayer meeting for his neighborhood once a week. The meeting grew quickly and one month after starting, the group decided to meet daily. Within months, newspapers estimated that 10,000 were gathering every day at noon to pray. Less than 10 years later, 50,000 new people had joined churches throughout the city, with less than a million in population overall. It started with one man, then one small group, who simply wanted to pray.
Should not all of us be praying similarly — for God’s Spirit to pour out on us and for Him to raise up people to initiate this kind of Spirit-filled, corporate, ongoing prayer?
This is the case in every “filling” in Acts (see Acts 2:4; 4:8 and 31; 7:55; 9:17-20; 13:9-12). Although being filled with the Spirit also results in gradual character transformation (see Galatians 5:16-23 and Acts 6:3), Luke focuses on this result.
Often, this sharing is in one-on-one conversations between renewed Christians and friends/strangers. Often, this happens (as in Acts 2) when renewed Christians gather together (see 1 Corinthians 14:24-25). The reality of Jesus gets communicated in a personal way that goes deep into the heart, arresting attention, creating curiosity, and arousing spiritual longing.
During times of renewal, this becomes the norm for a church, not the exception that only preachers or gifted evangelists engage in. These people were simple, uneducated Galileans (see Acts 2:7), yet their sharing was powerful. In a renewed church, there is a widespread excitement about God’s love, and a widespread confidence that the Holy Spirit can empower any and all of His people to effectively share what God has taught and shown them (see Acts 4:31; 8:4; 11:19-20).
Let us pray that God will renew our appreciation for His love and grace so that we want to tell others what He is doing in our lives! This may involve God revealing rival affections that are blocking this appreciation, but as we turn from these, He will fill us with His Spirit and renew our hearts so we want to share!
Throughout Acts, Luke shows that God kept thrusting them out in this way. They quenched the Spirit when they began to resist God’s desire to continue this multi-cultural movement.
God wants us to share His love to people “like us” — and in all spiritual renewals there is a harvest of people “like us” — family members, friends, neighbors, and so on. But renewal movements always spawn cross-cultural outreach. Jesus’ heart goes out to people who need to hear about Him who are not like us. He puts His concern for them in our hearts, and He forges opportunities to show and share His love with them — just like in Acts 2 . He wants to create a new family who are from very different racial and socio-economic and cultural backgrounds, and who retain their cultural differences, but also share the deep bond of knowing and loving Jesus. This is a powerful testimony to a world deeply divided over these differences that Jesus is real!
It is wonderful to see and hear people of very different backgrounds praise Jesus and engage with one another. It is exciting to see that God is giving people a heart to reach out to others who are very different from them But this is only the beginning. God wants to renew us to become a far more diverse church globally! Are you asking Him to do this, and following His guidance when He leads you to people who are different from you?
We see another classic sign of spiritual renewal in this Scriptural event. People responded to this Spirit-empowered demonstration of Jesus’ reality in one of two ways — many were moved to learn more (see Acts 2:12) and then get converted (see Acts 2:41), but some were resistant and mocked the Christians (see Acts 2:13). During spiritual renewal, people are polarized in their response to Christians’ witness. Paul describes the response to his own ministry in the same way: some may experience Jesus as a fragrant aroma and others may experience Him as the smell of death (see 2 Corinthians 2:15-16). This is a pattern throughout Acts — usually religious and/or community leaders who are jealous and/or threatened and slander the Christian movement.
During renewal, many people are struck by the presence of God through Christians and the boldness of their witness — and desire to learn more. And many of those, when they understand the message of the gospel, repent and entrust themselves to Jesus. During times of renewal, there are many inquirers at meetings like this, interest to learn more is high, and real decisions for Jesus are a stream, not a trickle.
But even when God is manifesting Himself in such a powerful way, there are still those who close their hearts to this and mock Jesus’ followers. God shows people their spiritual need and presses in on them about Jesus — and people, including friends and family members, divide over Him. Of course, some of those who initially respond negatively later get converted, like Paul. What becomes rare during renewal is indifference. Let us pray that God will empower us to see this kind of polarized response!
How does hearing about this affect you? Do you relate to it in your current spiritual experience? Praise God, and pray that He will enable you to be a catalyst for others. Does it remind you of when you were in a state of spiritual renewal, and does it make you want to return to this state? Pray for renewal, and that God will empower us to speak of it to others! Is it totally foreign to you? Then you may not know Christ, even if you have been a church-goer for your whole life. Tell Jesus that you do not have this spiritual reality, and ask Him to forgive you and give you His Holy Spirit!
