- This is the inaugural speech of the church and Peter stands up and says to them, "Nothing is ever going to be the same again." This is no longer a religion that belongs to a nation. See, he's speaking to Jews. They thought they understood what God was like. They owned God. But in the last days the spirit will be poured out on all flesh, not just Jewish flesh, all flesh. We might miss it, they would not. It is an incredibly offensive moment of saying, "Hey, just so you know relationship with God has been cracked open for everybody living on the earth. He will not be owned by one nation." Racism and nationalism have no part in the Kingdom of God. And I'm gonna say this because so ethnically I'm Armenian and Armenians are incredibly proud people group. And one of the earliest versions of the Bible is found in Armenian, and there's a whole lot of stuff. Mount Ararat is an Armenia so Armenians are very nationalistic around Christianity, but no one nation owns God. And I get nervous when I start hearing words about God changing the expression of Christianity through a nation. The British are gonna come and they're gonna change the world. We're gonna evangelize Africa cause Africa really needs the British help. Americans are gonna go all over the world because Americans really know how to do church and the rest of the world does. Armenians need to go and help. Do you hear what I'm saying? Nationalism has no part in the Kingdom of God. God made our different nations because they're beautiful, they're colorful, He loves diversity, but no one nation owns Him, and no one nation gets to be the hero of the rest of the world. Racism and nationalism has no part in the Kingdom of God. Your sons and your daughters shall prophesy. That was unthinkable. This was a gender separated society where sons were to take the lead, not daughters. And yet in this inaugural speech of the church, Peter stands up and says, "Remember the prophecy, both sons and daughters get to prophesy because in this new community, sexism has no part to play." In this new community, and we just see it actually in chapter one, where the women are praying with the disciples, which would be radical for the community. In this new community, all gender boundaries of you go over there cause you're a woman and you go over there because you're a man. All of that gets taken out because we are now the people of God where there is no slave and there is no Jew and there is no male and female. Now that doesn't mean gender doesn't exist. Just so you know, but it does mean that sexism doesn't. Men and women get to prophesy. The Holy Spirit has no gender specific agenda. He falls on everybody, whatever you are, whoever you are. The gifts of God know no sexism. Your young men shall see visions, your old men shall dream dreams. There's no junior Holy Spirit, there's also no geriatric one. There is no ageism in the kingdom of God, and sometimes we can patronize both the young and the old as if you can only do the stuff and live the adventure if you're between 20 and 50 that's nonsense. If you have a pulse, you're still on the planet to do something, right? Yeah. There is no ageism in this new kingdom. Even on my male servants, my female servants, there is no classism. In this day and age what He was saying was radical because servants didn't attend things in the same way. Religion was a privilege. You got to engage with God in a much closer way if you were free and if you own slaves. Slaves were too busy doing something else. But here you have the people of God, this inaugural speech, no nationalism or racism, no sexism, no ageism, and no classism. The Spirit of God will fall on who ever he wishes to and He will use them however He wishes and Peter is saying it's a new day guys. It's a new day guys. None of us can say we own God based on our racial background or our gender or the amount of money we have in the bank. All of those things have now become irrelevant. They are all beautiful gifts that God has given us that are secondary to the anointing the Power of the Spirit in our lives.
