THE BASIC PRINCIPLES OF
ORTHODOX RENEWAL
Part 5

What a momentous event that was when Heaven opened up and the Holy Spirit fell upon those one-hundred twenty disciples as they were waiting in the Upper Room, mindful of the promises of their divine Master Who had already ascended to His Father's throne of glory.

They were still timid, frightened and wavering sometimes in their faith. However, the moment they became filled with the Holy Spirit they were transformed. They were no longer the same. They were radically changed. The once fearful disciples were now bold. We see them now acting and speaking like different men, full of courage and with no concern for their own physical safety. They are now apostles who are ready to endure every suffering, and even death for their Savior and Lord.

We read in Acts Chapter 2, verses 3, 4: "...then there appeared to them tongues as of fire, distributed and resting on each one of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit, and began to speak in other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance."

The first indication that truly they were encountering an extraordinary visitation of Heaven's power is the speaking in other tongues, that is, in other languages. Why? Because the phenomenon cannot he explained in purely human terms. It was obviously a miraculous happening.

Why was the speaking in other tongues the initial evidence that the apostles were being inflilled with the Holy Spirit? Because praising God is the primary function of the Holy Spirit when He indwells the human heart. It is a supernaturally endowed gift that enables the believer to praise God "in Spirit and in truth."

The primary purpose of the gift of tongues (glossolalia) is to make it possible for the believer to praise and worship God in Holy Spirit power. It causes adoration to become more acceptable and well-pleasing to the Lord.

How can the gift of tongues then be the least of the gifts and thus unimportant, as some would have us believe'? As a matter of fact, I can say with no exaggeration that it is the most important of the gifts of the Holy Spirit, as supremely important as the praising of God itself is.

In the Book of Acts we see the immediate evidence of the Holy Spirit baptism was the gift of tongues. The reason for that is the fact the Holy Spirit overflows out of the mouth in a verbal expression of praise. Christ said: "...the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life." (John 4:l4).

The water that springs up from one's innermost being is the Holy Spirit. It wells up like an artesian well and the overflow is the charisma of tongues, namely praise and adoration of'Jesus. The function of the Holy Spirit is to glorify Jesus and to thank and exalt Him for that heavenly Unction.

Was not the very purpose of God's creation of man to glorify his Creator? Indeed, God wills that "...everything that has breath glorify the Lord!" (Psalm 150:6). The renewal of the initial inbreathing aims at renewing man's capacity to praise his Creator.

It is a wonderful blessing for you,dear reader, to exercise the gift of tongues. It will bring you into a supernatural dimension of praise and adoration. St. Paul said, "He that speaketh in an unknown tongue speaketh not unto men, but unto God, for no man understandeth him, howbeit in the Spirit he speaketh mysteries." (1 Corinthians 14:2).

Consequently, the one-hundred twenty in the Upper Room on the day of Pentecost were not addressing themselves in other tongues to the multitude of people that had gathered to witness that amazing occurrence.

The disciples were speaking to God in tongues they did not learn in the natural. They were bestowed upon them supernaturally. In their astonishment the people noted: "...we do hear them speak in our tongues the wonderful works of God." (Acts 5:11). Thus the disciples were not preaching to the people in other tongues. They were extolling the wonders of God in praise and glorification.

It was only Peter who subsequently preached to the people, not in other tongues, but in the spoken language of the people, in Aramaic, the vernacular of the Jews of that day.

"Standing up with the eleven, Peter lifted up his voice, and said unto them..." (Acts 2:14) He preached the first Christian sermon and explained to the people the meaning of those strange happenings. They heard the sound coming from Heaven, like the whistling of a mighty wind.

The Jews were bewildered. They were puzzled over seeing the disciples speaking in the languages of their ethnic origin. It must have sounded like a ninety mile-an-hour wind, similar to that of a cyclone. Only the sound of that kind of a wind could have attracted the attention of those thousands of Jews that had gathered in Jerusalem from all parts of the world to observe the Jewish feast of Pentecost.

They heard the language of their distant homeland spoken by those unschooled fishermen of Galilee who were in all probability staggering, hardly able to stand on their feet. They were drunk undoubtedly, but not with the new wine the onlookers had in mind. They were drunk with Heaven's New Wine, that is, with the inebriation of the Holy Spirit.

Paul said, "Be not drunk with wine...but be filled with the Spirit." (Eph. 5:18) Some Spirit-filled believers, even in our own day, become intoxicated with the Holy Spirit and very often fall to the floor under that divine power.

No one who is in the presence of God can stand motionless and physically unmoved. The three disciples at the Transfiguration of Jesus Christ fell on their faces before the dazzling display of His glory and majesty. Paul also fell to the ground when, on the Damascus road, he had a face-to-face meeting with the Jesus he was persecuting. That's what happens even today at some of the prayer meetings and services where the Holy Spirit is invoked with expectant faith. People fall to the ground under the power of the Holy Spirit. Many experience healings and other blessings at that moment.

It must be emphasized that the first result that the Holy Spirit baptism produces in the life of the believer is a greater capacity to praise and worship the Lord Jesus Christ. There is a greater capacity because there is, first and foremost, a burning desire for worship and adoration of God. The heart is fired up with a more fervent love for Him and with a longing to be in the presence of the Lord. That love generates a consuming passion for Christ and for praising Him. The believer's prayer life is deepened in a radical way that becomes visible and exciting.

Pentecost is not simply an event, it is an experience.

Christian believers of all churches and denominations have always looked back to the marvelous day of the descent of the Holy Spirit when the church was born in supernatural power. They long for the experience of Pentecost in all its fullness. They seem to feel it is missing from the church today and needs to he recovered.

The nostalgia for Pentecost has usually stemmed from the yearning for the spiritual power that fell from Heaven upon the one hundred-twenty in that Upper Room. The contrast of the contemporary church with the church depicted in the Book of Acts always prompts a looking back to Pentecost.

Those who are concerned with church renewal very often ask the questions: Why isn't the church today operating in the dimension of miraculous power in which it was founded on the day of Pentecost? Why is the Body of Christ languishing in a spiritually weakened state? Why doesn't the church demonstrate the Pentecostal power that we see manifested in the Infant Church of Acts?

There are believers in every generation that revert back in the effort to recapture the experience of Pentecost. When we think of renewal, revival and spiritual awakening, it is natural to look back to Pentecost for inspiration and for a standard. Pentecost is the established norm, as well as the source of renewed spiritual vitality of the church of every generation. Pentecost provides the pattern and the ideal in any renewal movement.

Renewal by its very nature necessitates a going back. It involves a going back to the glorious beginnings of the church in order to rediscover what has been lost or forgotten along the way, apostolic power. Pentecost teaches every generation of Christians that Holy Spirit power is the source of spiritual renewal. We cannot have the results of Pentecost without the power of Pentecost.

Pentecost marks the first renewal, and, as such, serves as the permanent standard and pattern divinely revealed for every renewal initiative. The disciples waited upon the Lord in prayer and travailed over a period of ten successive days in the Upper Room. The initiative was God's. The Lord had already left them His promise. He responded to their faith. They trusted in His love and grace. The fires of renewal came down from Heaven in response to their expectant faith.

It is not a matter of opinion. We have no choice in the matter. Renewal comes with a Pentecost experience. Members of the church must he endued afresh with "power from on high". The disciples were "baptized in the Holy Spirit" in that Upper Room exactly as their divine Master had promised them: "John truly baptized with water; but ye shall he baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days hence" (Acts 1:5). Even in our own day Christians need to be renewed with a fresh infilling of the Holy Spirit.

There have been men of God in every generation who have attempted to recapture the experience of Pentecost: the transforming and empowering unction of the Holy Spirit that initiates one into a new faith dimension. They have longed to re-enter into that Upper Room experience for the purpose of coming into a deeper relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ and of witnessing more effectively for the Gospel. They demonstrate that it is truly the "power of God" not only "unto salvation," but unto healing and deliverance from the oppression of the powers of darkness.

Renewal that is authentic and truly Orthodox comes "with a sound from Heaven." It cannot originate with a priest or bishop or a theologian or any church committee. Just as the original sacramental Seal was the "gift of the Holy Spirit." so in like manner is the renewing Unction a gift of the Holy Spirit. "It is not of him who wills or who runs but of Him who showeth mercy." (Romans 9:16) It is given to us by grace and by the good pleasure of the Father, and not because of our personal worthiness or merit.

Pentecost power comes with being "baptized in the Holy Spirit." This means that renewal by necessity has to be pentecostal and charismatic. It involves the restoration of Pentecost power, that is, supernatural power that quickens the word of God to our spirit and enables us to do the impossible for His Kingdom.

How does sacramental grace fit into the picture of spiritual renewal? Is this entire approach to the question of renewal indeed Orthodox?

As professing Orthodox Christians, we believe that we are in the Upper Room at the time we are chrismated sacramentally by the priest who anoints us saying, "The Seal of the Gift of the Holy Spirit." 'The Orthodox Church teaches that the sacrament of Chrismation represents the "baptism in the Holy Spirit:" It follows the sacrament of water baptism in which the believer is baptized by the Holy Spirit into Jesus Christ.

Furthermore. it is equally true that the believer is present in the Upper Room each time he participates in the sacrament of the Holy Eucharist. It is the normal occasion for Holy Spirit Renewal on a regular basis. According to Orthodox doctrine we are, as it were, rebaptized in the Holy Spirit each time we receive of the Holy Communion. Hence, the practice of singing at the close of the Divine Liturgy: "We have seen the true light...! We have received of the Heavenly Spirit...!"