Spirit of Torah
Part 4; The Spirit in the Early Body of Believers
MMin Kevin “Oriyan” Phipps

    This week we return to our series on the Holy Spirit. Last time we took a look at some of the teachings on the Holy Spirit in the Gospels and how He worked in the lives of some of God’s servants during the life of Yeshua. Now we have arrived at the beginning of the Body of Messiah. After celebrating the resurrection of our King, this is an appropriate time to do this teaching. I will start where I left off last time.

    After his death he showed himself to them and gave many convincing proofs that he was alive. During a period of forty days they saw him, and he spoke with them about the Kingdom of God. At one of these gatherings, he instructed them not to leave Yerushalayim but to "wait for what the Father promised, which you heard about from me. For Yochanan used to immerse people in water; but in a few days, you will be immersed in the Ruach HaKodesh!" [Acts 1:3-5]

     After seeing Yeshua resurrected from the dead, the teachings of Yeshua suddenly gelled and the talmidim knew who Yeshua was and what He came to do. This knowledge created a zeal in their heart to take it to the streets and tell everyone what they knew, in a way stronger than any group of Believers in history. This is like finding out a long war is over and no one else knows about it. This is truly good news that can’t be kept to one’s self. 
     The odd part of this story is that Yeshua tells them to wait. They needed to wait until they received the Spirit. Why? First, it was God’s work, not theirs. Their passion would have likely blinded them from the true will of God. No matter what evangelistic effort we seek to accomplish, and no matter how grand and beneficial to the Kingdom our projects may seem to us, the work is meaningless and can do more harm than good if not directed by the Holy Spirit.
     These new Believers were going to be getting started in a society hostile to them and their message of the Gospel. In these first days, they were a small group. If they were not careful, they could get themselves all arrested and killed just like their Messiah and the Gospel message would die with them. They had to be filled with the Holy Spirit and lead by the Holy Spirit to know where, when, and how to spread the Gospel to maintain safety. As much as I’m sure Yeshua appreciated their zeal, their passion had to be controlled and that meant the Spirit’s guidance and power to accomplish that.

    But you will receive power when the Ruach HaKodesh comes upon you; you will be my witnesses both in Yerushalayim and in all Y'hudah and Shomron, indeed to the ends of the earth!" [Acts 1:8]

     In our culture today, we like the word power. Power to us implies the ability to make things happen, whether we are using electrical power, mechanical power, solar power, financial power, or intellectual power, one way or another, we have the ability to control our lives and sometimes the lives of others. Such power feels good and is one of the primary pursuits of humanity. The more power the better. 
     Some may thing that in receiving power from the Holy Spirit, Yeshua is telling His talmidim that they weill be able to accomplish anything. This kind of thinking can lead to trouble and often does. In actuality, the Greek word for power is dunamis. Sound familiar? It is the word from which the English word dynamite comes from. Here again, we tend to think of this word in a positive way, such as in the dynamite teaching you are getting today.  Actually, one of the definitions of dynamite, is “something that has great potential to cause trouble or conflict”, which puts new meaning to this being a dynamite teaching. It also shows us something more to what Yeshua was actually telling His talmidim when He said they would receive dunamis when the Ruach came upon them. Like His message, their message would cause division. The way in which they would live their lives would be unacceptable to both Jew and Gentile. Yeshua said that He had not come to bring peace, but a sword, and now He is passing the same sword to them.

    The festival of Shavu`ot arrived, and the believers all gathered together in one place. Suddenly there came a sound from the sky like the roar of a violent wind, and it filled the whole house where they were sitting.  Then they saw what looked like tongues of fire, which separated and came to rest on each one of them. They were all filled with the Ruach HaKodesh and began to talk in different languages, as the Spirit enabled them to speak. Now there were staying in Yerushalayim religious Jews from every nation under heaven. When they heard this sound, a crowd gathered; they were confused, because each one heard the believers speaking in his own language…How is it that we hear them speaking in our own languages about the great things God has done?" … Kefa answered them, "Turn from sin, return to God, and each of you be immersed on the authority of Yeshua the Messiah into forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Ruach HaKodesh! [Acts 2:2-6,11,38]

     There are several things I want us to notice here in Acts 2. First, this was an unplanned event, with the exception of the Biblical holiday of Shavuot. The Believers were all together in one place at the Temple, but were in the midst of other observant Jews from around the world. All of them were from Galilee. Note that these new Believers were still observing Torah and that is what they were doing when the Holy Spirit came upon them, filled them, and enabled them to begin to speak in tongues. It is important for us to notice who was speaking in tongues, which was all of them, not just one or two. All the Believers began to speak in tongues. It is important for us to notice who the recipient of the gift was, meaning who benefitted from the gift. Unbelievers! This gift was not given for the edification of the Body, at least not at this time. It was given in order to create a mind blowing experience, remember the dynamite principle, for the unbelievers present at the Temple that day, so that they would be able to accept the message of the Gospel that Kefa/Peter would then give to them. I want us to also notice the nature of the message Kefa gave them. It was not, Yeshua said such and such. He starts out talking about the prophet Yoel/Joel. He uses his words to show them truth about Messiah Yeshua. Then he goes back to the words of King David, and explains how words he said related to Yeshua, not David. He then Tells them it is the power of the Holy Spirit of God given to them through Yeshua, the Son of God and Messiah that they were witnessing. In this, their hearts were moved and asked what they should do. Notice what Kefa tells them next, “Turn from sin”. Sin is defined by John in 1John 3:2 as transgression of Torah. So the first thing he tells them is to repent from their lack of Torah observance, begin following the true Torah, rather than the laws of men, then he tells them to be baptized into the authority of Yeshua. The end result of both these things is the gift of the Holy Spirit. Not only do they understand what Kefa is telling them, but 3,000 are added to their number that day. That my friends is how you do evangelism!
     I am no prophet, at least that I know of, but as I have been mingling and networking with churches in the area I have been hearing and seeing some things in the church that have caused me to see something on the horizon of Christendom. I believe we are on the verge of a split in the church, unseen since the Reformation. Preparations in the heart and mind of Believers are being made to get many of them ready to accept the value of Torah observance. Many will suddenly embrace Torah, while there will still be many who will cling to their old ways. Entire churches will split, some will dismantle, and new churches will form which will be Torah observant churches, not necessarily Messianic, as that is more of a Jewish entity, but Torah observant churches with Believers lead by the Spirit of God to learn Torah and apply Torah to their lives as part of their faith in Messiah Yeshua. This is why some of us have been called out of the church early to get a head start, because the Holy Spirit is going to use us to teach them what all this means.
 There will be many, especially pastors, who will be very hostile to us, but we see in Acts 2 how to get hostile people to listen to what we have to say. First the Holy Spirit uses us to create a mind blowing experience, then we have to be prepared to instill Torah into them, linking Torah to Messiah, then showing them that what they are experiencing is of the Holy Spirit. Some may still not Believe, but it will be out of their rebellion against God. 
     All this is in preparation for the coming of our Messiah and the establishment of His Kingdom on earth. Evil is growing in this world, and God is going to prepare Believers to be able to combat, at times literally, the forces of evil that are gaining more and more ground in this world. Soon, God will no longer use those nominal Believers who do not take His Word seriously to accomplish His Word. Only those who study His Word and apply it to their lives will be used, and in doing so, His power will be magnified. We will begin to see signs and wonders unlike anything we have seen since the Bible days. 

    Kefa and Yochanan were still speaking to the people when the cohanim, the captain in charge of the Temple police, and the Tz'dukim came upon them, very annoyed that they were teaching the people the doctrine of resurrection from the dead and offering Yeshua as proof. The Temple police arrested them; and since it was already evening, they put them in custody overnight. However, many of those who heard the message trusted; the number of men alone was about five thousand.  The next day, the people's rulers, elders and Torah-teachers assembled in Yerushalayim, along with `Anan the cohen hagadol, Kayafa, Yochanan, Alexander and the other men from the family of the cohen hagadol. They had the emissaries stand before them and asked, "By what power or in what name did you do this?" Then Kefa, filled with the Ruach HaKodesh, said to them, "Rulers and elders of the people! If we are being examined today about a good deed done for a disabled person, if you want to know how he was restored to health, then let it be known to you and to all the people of Isra'el that it is in the name of the Messiah, Yeshua from Natzeret, whom you had executed on a stake as a criminal but whom God has raised from the dead, that this man stands before you perfectly healed.  "This Yeshua is the stone rejected by you builders which has become the cornerstone. There is salvation in no one else! For there is no other name under heaven given to mankind by whom we must be saved!" [Acts 4:1-12]

     Many of us don’t like conflict. We tend to avoid situations where someonw might disagree with us, reject us, or worse. However, most of the time, God’s people don’t accomplish much unless they rock the boat. Compliance never changes anything. Yeshua’s life lead Him to a cross, and He has told each of us to deny ourselves, pick up our own cross and follow Him. Some of us may be thrown our of churches, some will lose friends and family, some may lose their jobs, some may even end up in jail and have to explain themselves before pagan judges. As we continue through Acts and get into the rest of the letters, we will see that these are the times when God does His greatest work, through the power of the Holy Spirit and through His apostles, the ambassadors of Truth in a dark world.
     When a building is no longer structurally sound, the only thing that can be done is to blow is apart and a build a new building. The church as a whole is no longer structurally sound, and God is giving those who are true to His word the dunamis they need to blow some stuff up and rebuild according to God’s Ways rather than man’s. Things won’t be easy, but as we learn the value of community as the early Body of Believers did, God’s use that community to sustain us and add daily to our numbers as He did in Acts. Before you know it there will be an inferno of Torah revival in this nation and in the world that cannot be stopped, just as the Gospel of Yeshua did 2,000 years ago.