Rev. Doug Floyd

Pentecost 2026 – Witnesses
Rev. Doug Floyd
Genesis 11:1-9, Psalm 104:24–35, Acts 2:1-11, John 14:8-17

But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.” (Acts 1:8, ESV)

The disciples are waiting and praying and seeking the Lord. They gather with the women, with Mary the mother of Jesus, and with His brothers. As Christopher pointed out last week, the miracle is that they have not scattered. At His crucifixion and death, the disciples scattered, but now they wait. Christ called them to wait, and they obey.

Jesus told them, “Thus it is written, that the Christ should suffer and on the third day rise from the dead, and that repentance for the forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed in his name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things. And behold, I am sending the promise of my Father upon you. But stay in the city until you are clothed with power from on high.”” (Luke 24:46–49, ESV)

They are staying, waiting, watching, praying. The day of Pentecost arrives and suddenly a mighty rushing wind fills the house. Tongues of fire come down upon them. They are all filled with the Holy Spirit.

This morning, let’s briefly pause over this verse from last week: But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.” (Acts 1:8, ESV)

The Spirit will make them (and us) witnesses, and they (and we) will eventually bear witness to the ends of the earth.

In Acts 1, we hear Jesus say, “You will be my witnesses.” You will bear witness what you have seen and heard of Jesus Christ. You have seen and heard and even touched. Now you must speak. Thus, the Spirit comes upon them in tongues of fire. Tongues set on fire by the Spirit of the Living God.

The disciples and the people of God often struggle to bear witness. Think about life in general. Humans love to speak what they barely know. I have often been guilty of saying more than I know and even being ready to argue about it. Usually days later, I tell Kelly well it looks like you were right after all.

Whether online or in person, we can communicate with such confidence though in reality we speak in fragments. It is difficult to admit we are always learning up until the day we die.

In 1970, Bob Dylan sang “My Back Pages.” He sings,

Half-wracked prejudice leaped forth
“Rip down all hate,” I screamed
Lies that life is black and white
Spoke from my skull. I dreamed
Romantic facts of musketeers
Foundationed deep, somehow
Ah, but I was so much older then
I’m younger than that now[1]

The prophet must face his limitations. In this song, Dylan confesses that he realizes life is more complex than he understood. I love this last line,

Ah, but I was so much older then
I’m younger than that now

My own life has often been the journey of humility. Of recognizing, I know less than I once thought I knew. If we follow the lives of these Apostles, we come to see that even as they are empowered to be witness, the Spirit is making the true witnesses over time.

Zeal for the Lord consumed Paul even as he sought to consume the early church in a fire of judgment. Then the Lord confronts him. He is broken. That same driven Pharisee comes face to face with his own lack. In Philippians 3, Paul confesses his ongoing pursuit to know the truth, that is to know Christ.

“though I myself have reason for confidence in the flesh also. If anyone else thinks he has reason for confidence in the flesh, I have more: circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; as to the law, a Pharisee; as to zeal, a persecutor of the church; as to righteousness under the law, blameless. But whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith— that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead.” (Philippians 3:4–11, ESV)

Even as Paul writes, he is still in pursuit of Christ. He has not mastered a set of ideas, a series of doctrinal formulations, a confession of faith. He is pursuing the person of Jesus Christ. In this pursuit, he recognizes his own weakness. This fiery preacher of the Gospel who has set the empire ablaze with the truth of Jesus Christ, confesses, “For I am the least of the apostles, unworthy to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God.” (1 Corinthians 15:9, ESV)

He has grown weaker over time. It’s not that he doubts the message and person of Jesus Christ, it that he acknowledges he is a weak vessel. He needs God’s Spirit to keep leading him to Jesus, to keep speaking through him to reveal Jesus. He needs the grace of God to bear witness to the risen Lord.

While we seek to learn of Jesus and study our faith and even the history of our church, we also recognize our absolute dependence on the Spirit of God to make us true witnesses of Jesus Christ. In that sense, life is a continual turning to Christ, a continual cry for mercy, a continual pattern of humbling myself under the mighty hand of God and before the people of God.

We learn from each other. My heart must always be open to criticism or correction or wisdom for I used to be so much older then but I’m younger than that now. I realize I need you. We all need each other as we all pursue Christ together.

It might help to consider a single human life to understand how we are becoming true witnesses. A baby is born. It cannot speak. The babe can breathe, cry. The Greek word for breath or wind is Pnuema, spirit. The Spirit of God is likened to wind or breath. A babe cannot articulate words, but it can breathe. In that simple state she is still bearing witness to the miracle of life, the gift of God. As the child grows, she learns to repeat words and even speak sentences. She is gradually become an articulation of God’s grace in word and deed.

As she grows up in a faith community, she sings song of faith, to physically acts out faith in bowing, in communion, in embracing, in praying, in blessing others. The witness of God is taking shape in and through her over time. By the Spirit of God, she is becoming a witness of Jesus Christ.

By God’s grace her words and deeds are uniting in the love of Christ. Eventually, she will grow old and frail. I sat with a dear friend this week who ended up dying yesterday. He spent his life speaking about Christ to people all over the world. On Thursday, he could barely speak. He had quit eating. Like a babe, he would wake, breathe, sleep.

In these last moments of life, he was bearing witness to Christ. The Spirit of God is work in and through Him to reveal God’s grace and truth. On Saturday he fell asleep one last time and his breath left, expired. He followed the Spirit of God into the bosom of Christ and rests in God’s love where one day, he will rise in Christ as a true and perfect witness.

We are all following in His steps. The Spirit is bearing witness in and through us now and will one day take us into the fullness of love.

Back to the disciples. But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.” (Acts 1:8, ESV)

Listen to the second half of the verse: “you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.”

The disciples will bear witness to Jesus in Jerusalem, but it doesn’t stop there. They continue to all Judea and then Samaria and finally to the ends of the earth. Philip is on the road from Jerusalem to Gaza when he meets an Ethiopian eunuch. He answers the eunuch’s questions and baptizes him. Then suddenly he is passing through Azotus on the way to Caesarea. These are Hellenist cities that contain Jews and other populations. Paul and Barnabas eventually travel throughout the empire preaching to Jews and Gentiles. We see the Spirit calling His saints beyond Jerusalem toward the ends of the earth.

As we think about this witness of Christ going to the ends of the earth, let’s return to the day of Pentecost. Peter is preaching the Gospel. We read in Acts 2:6, “And at this sound the multitude came together, and they were bewildered, because each one was hearing them speak in his own language.” (Acts 2:6, ESV) Then we read a list of the various people visiting from different regions. They are not hearing the word in Hebrew but in their own language: “Parthians and Medes and Elamites and residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya belonging to Cyrene, and visitors from Rome, both Jews and proselytes, Cretans and Arabians—..hear them telling in our own tongues the mighty works of God.”” (Acts 2:9–11, ESV)

The Spirit is working through Peter to address people in their own languages. This fits with our first reading where we encounter the story of the tower of Babel. People are speaking one language. They’re building a tower. But the Lord frustrates their plans by separating their languages, then they disperse all over the face of the earth. This week I read a reflection on Pentecost by Christine Sine.[2] She references Welsh theologian Dewi Hughes. He suggests that the confusing of languages in the Babel story reinforces God’s intent to spread people across the ends of the earth, speaking different languages.

The Pentecost story reinforces this idea of keeping distinct cultures and languages. There is a beauty in the particularity of different cultures and people groups. At the same time, there is a beauty in the particularity of each person. We are united in Christ not in external factors of language and dress.

As we worship together and share life while remaining particular people with unique perspectives on the world. We learn from one another. Over the years, I’ve had a series of experiences that reflected my own misunderstanding of how the Spirit moves. When I was young, I dreamed of people falling and crying out to God when I preached like the Great Awakening. That never happened.

One night I dreamed I was trying to share with a guy, but he kept arguing with me. In the dream, I shrunk down small enough to enter his brain and change his thoughts so he would agree with me. Instantly, I woke up realizing I wanted power to control him, and that’s not the way of the Spirit. His lovingkindness leads us to repentance not power, not control.

The difficulty is that people will not always agree with us. The goal is not to associate only with people who agree with us. Nor is it to find a rock-solid argument that no one can deny. We humbly speak and humbly listen.

We simply live out our witness in word and deed, recognizing that we are frail and sometimes mistaken. We trust that the Spirit will translate our fumbling attempts to share Christ into a true word that another person can hear. Then we entrust them to God. Sometimes the most angry people are at the very edge of faith. We simply don’t know. We love. We bear witness, and we trust God’s goodness.

On this glorious day of Pentecost, I am thankful that the Spirit of God has been poured out upon each of us. He is opening our eyes and ears to Christ. He is strengthening us to worship. And he is raising us up as witness to our risen Lord, Jesus Christ.

[1] “My Back Pages” on < https://www.bobdylan.com/songs/my-back-pages/>

[2] Christine Sine, “Meditation Monday – Pentecost Has Come.” < https://godspacelight.com/meditation-monday-pentecost-has-come/>