What does Acts 2:2 mean?
Jesus has told His followers to stay in Jerusalem until they are baptized with the Holy Spirit (Acts 1:4–5), and their patience is rewarded. The word translated as "Spirit" is pneuma, which can also refer to breath or wind. The Pneumatos Hagiou, or "Holy Spirit" is a person—an individual with personality—and one of the three members of the Trinity. In the Old Testament, He often appeared as some form of wind. To Job, He answered from a whirlwind (Job 38:1). To Ezekiel, He was a stormy wind (Ezekiel 1:4). To Elijah, He came as a low whisper (1 Kings 19:12). Like here, He filled the room when Solomon dedicated his temple (1 Kings 8:10–11).When Jesus spoke to Nicodemus about being born again, He said, "The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit" (John 3:8). Jesus did the work required to reconcile us to God with His sacrifice on the cross. The Holy Spirit indwells those who believe and equips them to further spread that good news. He emboldens believers in their preaching (Acts 4:31), affirms their teaching (Acts 6:10), tells them whom to talk to (Acts 8:29), identifies who should do the talking (Acts 13:2), leads them in what to say (Acts 15:28), and tells them where to go (Acts 16:6–7).
The Jews tasked with starting the church are facing a serious paradigm shift, and the help of the Holy Spirit is vital for that work. Nothing like this has happened in Jewish history before. Under the Mosaic law, the responsibilities of the Jews were to obey God and remove themselves from the evil nations around them. Now, Jewish representatives are called to go out into Gentile nations and teach them about their Jewish Savior. Only the Holy Spirit can make sense of this.
What's described here is a sound, not a sensation. The Christians hear a sound, compared to the sound of wind—they don't feel a blast of fast-moving air.
