As we read and talked I began to reflect on some of the things I've been reading lately and the overall pattern of my thinking about church for the last 20 or more years. As I looked at the whole story of that day recorded in Acts 2 a questioned formed in my mind: When we ask God to pour out his Spirit upon us, what do we expect? Moreover, where is the focus of that outpouring?
I think most often the focus is on the church as the inside world of the believing community. We want God to pour out his Spirit to enrich our worship, improve our discipleship and increase our experience of him. But that's not the point of the outpouring on Acts 2.
In Acts 2 the impact of the outpouring of the Holy Spirit was mission. The church as it was in the meeting room found itself empowered and thrust out into the community. 3,000 people were added to the church, not by being drawn to the room, but by their encounter with the gospel.
I just wonder if the biggest challenge is to set ourselves free from the selfishness of prioritising our needs over and above the mission of God.
The change in mindset that this requires might be a quantum leap for many of us as we move away from developing programme after programme of outreach towards becoming a truly missional community. It's a change that will take great courage and faith, but a change that I feel more and more convinced will need to happen if we are going to become the partners of God in his great mission-movement to the world he loves so dearly that even the life of his Son was a price worth paying to redeem it.
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