Pondering Pentecost 2019: Weekly Summary

Weekly Summary of Devotional Thoughts Posted to Social Media

Week 1 Focus: To be filled with the Spirit requires us to wait expectantly.

April 22

“The initial message to those early apostles is ‘wait.’ Wait in Jerusalem. Wait for the Spirit. Wait for the power to witness. Wait to be sent. So they wait.” —John Johnson, “The ‘Sent’ of Pentecost”

April 23

“There are some spiritual conditions that cannot be accomplished in a moment. The breaking up of the fallow ground takes time. The frosts of winter are as necessary as the rains of spring to prepare the soil for fertility. God has to break our hearts to pieces by the slow process of His discipline, and grind every particle to powder, and then to mellow us and saturate us with His blessed Spirit, until we are open for the blessing He has to give us.” —A. B. Simpson, The Holy Spirit, or Power from on High

April 24

“Do we realize our need to depend on Him? Have we really understood that we likely need to be emptied before He can fill us? Are we truly committed to staying and waiting until we ‘have been clothed with power from on high’?” —Howard Culbertson, “Waiting on the Holy Spirit”

April 25

“These waiting days were necessary to enable the disciples to realize their need, their nothingness, their failure and their dependence upon the Master. They had to get emptied first, before they could get filled.” —A. B. Simpson, The Holy Spirit, or Power from on High

April 26

“The discipline of waiting on the Holy Spirit is a powerful reminder to me that I’m not to be the one ultimately in charge. I need to be reminded of that often. When we truly learn to wait on God, we discover how great He is, how immense His love is toward us, how powerful He is and how involved He wants to be in our lives.” ——Howard Culbertson, “Waiting on the Holy Spirit”

April 27

“Sometimes we must wait for the Spirit. The disciples had to wait in the Upper Room. Our Upper Rooms also invite us to gather together, pray, listen, defer. But, with clean hands and hearts, the Spirit is sure to ultimately descend and bring life. You will be able to hear it.” —Jim Lyon, “Hear Life”

April 28

“Christ had promised His disciples on that last evening together that He would not really leave them. He had assured them that He would always be a part of them—as he was a part of God—that His life would be their life, and His strength their strength. Very likely they did not understand what He meant. Probably in the dark days that followed His crucifixion they almost forgot that He had said anything of the kind. But they did stay on in Jerusalem as He told them to do; and on the day of Pentecost, as they were celebrating the feast of the first fruits, an unforgettable event took place.” —Rachel Henderlite, A Call to Faith, 102