What was Christ's promise and command to His disciples before His final ascension to heaven? Acts 1:6-9.
"As the disciples waited for the fulfillment of the promise, they humbled their hearts in true repentance and confessed their unbelief... "The disciples prayed with intense earnestness for a fitness to meet men and in their daily intercourse to speak words that would lead sinners to Christ. Putting away all differences, all desire for the supremacy, they came close together in Christian fellowship.'--The Acts of the Apostles, pp. 36, 37.
How would you describe the result of the apostles' submission to Christ's instructions? Acts 2:1-8, 41-47; 4:13, 33.
The day of Pentecost was not a unique and unrepeated manifestation of God's power through the apostles' witness. It was the inauguration of the power that increasingly attended their work until the close of their lives, as the entire book of Acts makes evident.
"Everywhere the gospel was proclaimed. . . . The hearts of the disciples were surcharged with a benevolence so full, so deep, so far reaching, that it impelled them to go to the ends of the earth, testifying, God forbid that we should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. As they proclaimed the gospel as the power of God unto salvation, hearts yielded to the power of the Holy Spirit. New territory was daily added to the church.'--My Life Today, p. 61.
If we put away selfishness, dissension, pride, and vanity as did the early disciples, the same zeal for Christ's glory and for the salvation of others will produce similar results.
Someone has said that "before Christ sent the church into the world, He sent the Spirit into the church. The same order must be observed today." Pray now for the power of Pentecost in your life. Is there anything other than praying that you can do to ensure that the Holy Spirit will fill your life?