Through the Bible - Acts

And being assembled together with them, [Jesus] commanded them that they should not depart from Jerusalem, but wait for the promise of the Father... For John truly baptized with water; but ye shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost not many days hence... But ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you: and ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judaea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth. (Acts 1:4–8)

The book of Acts is not finished even today — God is still writing the story of His Spirit-empowered church.

A Book Without Which the New Testament Wouldn't Make Sense

This is a great book of Scripture. If you were to remove Acts from the New Testament, the whole would lose so much of its fullness. We've been going a book a week through the entire Bible for about a year, and having finished Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, we now come to Acts.

In my Bible it is titled The Acts of the Apostles, and in one sense that's true. The author is thought to be Luke himself, because just as the Gospel of Luke was written to Theophilus, Acts 1:1 picks up right where Luke leaves off, with Jesus about to ascend into heaven.

The Real Central Character: The Holy Spirit

In the Great Commission of Matthew 28, the church for 1,900 years has focused on "go, go, go into all the world." Acts shows that fulfillment from the very start. But there's a key word the church tends to skip: not just go, but lo — "Lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age."

We call this the Acts of the Apostles because we see the ministry of Peter, James, John, Paul, Timothy, Silas, Barnabas, and many others. Yet the figure seen more than any other in these 28 chapters is the Holy Spirit. By my count there are over 57 references to the Holy Spirit — He is mentioned in every single chapter. This book should probably be called the Acts of the Holy Spirit. He draws people to the Lord, stirs the church to go out, gives boldness, gives the words to speak, and the power to perform miracles.

Two Ministries of the Spirit: In You and Upon You

In John's Gospel, the upper room discourse (John 14–16) clues us into the ministry of the Spirit. In John 16, the Spirit is in the world convicting it of sin, of righteousness, and of judgment. Jesus tells the disciples the Spirit "is with you, and shall be in you." Then in John 20 He breathes on them: "Receive ye the Holy Ghost." I believe that is when they received the indwelling of the Spirit and were truly born again — for no one could be born again until Jesus, the firstfruits, had risen from the dead.

But here in Acts 1 we read of another ministry. Jesus tells these disciples who already have the indwelling Spirit to wait in Jerusalem for the promise of the Father. This is the coming upon of the Spirit — the epi experience, epi being the Greek word for "upon." Paul tells us in 1 Corinthians 6 that we are the temple of the Holy Spirit; the Spirit indwells the believer. But the coming upon gives the dynamic, the dunamis, the power of God to accomplish what He has called us to do.

God's Power, Not Ours

If it were left to you and me to make disciples of all nations in our own strength, we would fail. And the church has largely failed by trying. Look at the church in America over the last 50 years: with all its technology and great things, it has tried to do God's work without God's power.

A. W. Tozer once said that if you removed the Holy Spirit from the first-century church, 90% of what they did would come to a slamming halt. But if you removed the Holy Spirit from the American church today, 90% of its work would keep right on going as if nothing had happened.

Pastor Richard has long used the analogy of a glove: when the Holy Spirit puts His hand in us, He can use us for great things, but the glove left lying on the podium does nothing. We need the Spirit moving in and through and overflowing us, as Jesus said in John 7 — "out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water," which John tells us spoke of the Spirit.

Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and the Uttermost Parts

Jesus never calls us to do something He has not already fulfilled. Notice that He fulfilled this very pattern in the Gospel of John: His ministry begins when He cleanses the temple in Jerusalem (John 2), moves into Judea (John 3:22), then to Samaria and the woman at the well (John 4), and then into Galilee of the Gentiles (John 4:43), going back and forth between the Jewish region and the Decapolis. From Jerusalem, to Judea, to Samaria, to the uttermost parts.

He calls us to the same. This does not mean we all board a plane to Jerusalem; it means our ministry begins at home, in our own sphere of influence. As we are faithful in little things, He moves us out into the surrounding regions — from Escondido to North County, to Southern California, to America, to the uttermost parts.

Pushed Out of the Nest by Persecution

About five years after Jesus said this, where were the apostles? Still in Jerusalem. Acts 1:8 had to turn into Acts 8:1: "And Saul was consenting unto his death. And at that time there was a great persecution against the church which was at Jerusalem; and they were all scattered abroad throughout the regions of Judaea and Samaria, except the apostles." Saul made havoc of the church, hauling men and women to prison — and so they were scattered abroad and went everywhere preaching the word, exactly as God had called them.

We may begin to see correlations to our own nation. We aren't experiencing persecution yet, but our nation is going through great financial difficulty and havoc, and I believe the Lord may be using it to stir us to preach the gospel. When the things people trust in are shaken and fall, they look for something that stands strong — and there is only one foundation that cannot be moved: Jesus Christ. We may yet move into a time of difficulty and persecution, but right now we have great religious liberty. May the Lord stir us to use it.

The Keys of the Kingdom Given to Peter

In Matthew 16, after Peter's great confession, Jesus said, "Upon this rock I will build my church," and added, "I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven." Throughout Europe you can identify a statue of Peter because he is always holding keys. What does that mean?

Paul tells us in Romans 1:16 that the gospel is the power of God unto salvation "to the Jew first, and also to the Greek." In Acts, Peter is the one God uses to open the gospel door to both. To the Jews, it begins at Pentecost.

Pentecost: The Door Opened to the Jews

And when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all with one accord in one place. And suddenly there came a sound from heaven as of a rushing mighty wind... And there appeared unto them cloven tongues like as of fire, and it sat upon each of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and began to speak with other tongues... (Acts 2:1–4)

Jews, devout men out of every nation, heard them speak in their own languages and were amazed; some mocked, saying these men were full of new wine. But Peter stood up with the eleven and preached, quoting the prophet Joel — "I will pour out of my Spirit upon all flesh" — and declaring Jesus of Nazareth, "him... ye have taken, and by wicked hands have crucified and slain." God used Peter to open the door of the gospel to the Jews.

Cornelius: The Door Opened to the Gentiles

In Acts 10, Peter is in Joppa, on the rooftop of Simon the Tanner. The Lord gives him a vision of a sheet let down from heaven full of unclean animals, and three times tells him, "What God hath cleansed, that call not thou common." Then the Spirit sends him with the men waiting downstairs to the house of Cornelius, a Roman centurion. As Peter preaches, the Gentiles are filled with the Holy Spirit and saved. When Peter returns to Jerusalem (Acts 11:18), the believers glorify God, saying, "Then hath God also to the Gentiles granted repentance unto life." With the keys, Peter opened the gospel first to the Jew and then to the Gentile — and the gospel now goes out into all the world.

The First Word of the Gospel

Did you know the gospel has a first word? Some guess love, or grace, or God. But in Matthew 3:2 John the Baptist preached, "Repent: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand." Jesus' first preaching in Matthew 4:17 was the same. When the Jews cried out in Acts 2:38, Peter said, "Repent." When the Gentiles believed, Acts 11:18 records that God granted them "repentance unto life." Paul testified in Acts 20:21 "to the Jews, and also to the Greeks, repentance toward God, and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ." And Luke 24:47 says repentance and remission of sins should be preached in His name among all nations, beginning at Jerusalem.

What is repentance? It is turning away from yourself as god to God as God — turning from this worldly system toward Him, putting your faith in Him, and following Him.

From Persecutor to Apostle: Saul of Tarsus

Acts traces the church taking the gospel everywhere — Peter and John in Jerusalem, Stephen preaching though appointed to wait on tables, Philip touring and preaching miraculously. Then we meet Saul of Tarsus, a Pharisee who made havoc of the church, carrying letters from the chief priest to Damascus to bind Christians.

On the road in Acts 9, a great light at midday knocked him down and a voice said, "Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me?" Notice that Jesus takes persecution of His church personally. "Who art thou, Lord?" "I am Jesus whom thou persecutest." Everything Saul had done in the name of the Lord was flipped on its head. Blinded for three days, he was prayed for by Ananias — who protested, "Lord, we know this guy is bad news" — and the scales fell from his eyes.

Then he began to preach in the synagogue at Damascus. Imagine the man coming to destroy the church now teaching it — it would be like Osama bin Laden standing up here teaching us the Bible. I imagine the early church had been praying that Saul would be killed, and in a sense God did: He killed Saul of Tarsus and raised up Paul the Apostle. How thankful we can be for prayers God does not answer the way we ask them.

The Missionary Journeys

From Damascus, Paul went to Jerusalem, then to Antioch, where he met Barnabas. Their first journey took them to Cyprus and then into Galatia, where they planted churches, before returning to the Jerusalem council that worked out how the Gentile believers would be received. Thankful for that, since most of us are Gentiles.

On the second journey a sharp contention arose over John Mark, Barnabas's nephew, who had turned back on the first journey. Paul — the apostle of grace — said, "He's not coming with us." So Paul took Silas, and Barnabas took John Mark to Cyprus, and Acts follows Paul.

When God Leads by Closing Doors

Now when they had gone throughout Phrygia and the region of Galatia, [they] were forbidden of the Holy Ghost to preach the word in Asia... they assayed to go into Bithynia: but the Spirit suffered them not... And a vision appeared to Paul in the night; There stood a man of Macedonia... saying, Come over into Macedonia, and help us. (Acts 16:6–9)

Often when we wait on God we expect harps and a booming voice. But look how God led here: Paul wanted to push east into Asia, yet God moved him from city to city westward until he was cornered at Troas, a port city on the sea. He could go no further unless he got on a boat into Europe. The doors were slammed in his face. Sometimes God leads us in exactly the opposite direction we've been trying to go.

When the Macedonian vision came, notice Luke writes "we" — he joins the company. This is the first time the gospel moves into Europe. At Philippi there was no synagogue, so Paul went to the river and found Lydia and a group of God-fearing women, and they came to faith.

The Journey to Rome

On the third journey Paul spent three years in Ephesus, where a healing sparked a great uproar before the crowds turned on him, yet God used it mightily. Heading back, everyone warned him not to go to Jerusalem because the Spirit testified he would be arrested — but he knew the Lord had called him there. Arrested and held, with men vowing not to eat until he was dead, he was moved by night to Caesarea, where God used him to preach to King Agrippa and the dignitaries. Finally he appealed to Caesar and was brought to Rome, just as the Lord had told him in a night vision: "Thou must bear witness also at Rome."

And Paul dwelt two whole years in his own hired house, and received all that came in unto him, preaching the kingdom of God, and teaching those things which concern the Lord Jesus Christ, with all confidence, no man forbidding him. (Acts 28:30–31)

It is an interesting way to end a book, because there really is no end to the acts of the Holy Spirit. Paul was beheaded in the mid-60s AD, so this was written before his death, which establishes a very early date for both Acts and Luke and shows how quickly these things happened after Jesus' resurrection. The book isn't finished even today — and how the Lord brings things full circle. Though He once forbade Paul from entering Asia, He is using our church to take the gospel into Asia, planting churches in the Philippines, and this Friday Kelly and others are going to China for three weeks to serve the Lord.

The Resurrection: Foundation of the Apologetic

Take careful note of how the apostles preached. The key thing they used to prove the authenticity of their message was the resurrection of Jesus. It was not the philosophical proofs — the teleological, cosmological, or ontological arguments. They rested everything on the fact that Christ rose from the dead and was seen by eyewitnesses.

If you read the good apologetics works — Josh McDowell's Evidence That Demands a Verdict, or Lee Strobel's The Case for Christ — both focus on the evidence of the resurrection. Peter uses it in Acts 2, Stephen in Acts 7, Paul throughout; the resurrection is preached no fewer than 15 times in Acts. "We heard him, we saw him, we handled him, and he raised from the dead." If He is not dead in a tomb today, then His words are true, for He prophesied His own resurrection and said He is the Son of God.

The Right Person in the Right Place

Ray Stedman, commenting on Philip and the Ethiopian eunuch in Acts 8, captured what it means to be Spirit-led. Philip was sent down a desert road to a man reading the scroll of Isaiah, opened to Isaiah 53. "Understandest thou what thou readest?" "How can I, except some man should guide me?" And Philip preached Christ to him from that passage. Stedman said: it was "the right man at the right place at the right time saying the right thing to the right person." That is what it means to be a Spirit-led witness.

I have found that when I ask the Lord for an opportunity to share the gospel, within a few hours He brings me the right person He has been working on by His Spirit. You don't have to be Philip, Paul, or Peter, or the man with the keys of the kingdom. God has given us the words of eternal life, and we need only ask, "Lord, lead me by Your Spirit to speak to someone today; give me the words to say." He has promised to do so. "Ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you: and ye shall be witnesses unto me." That is what Acts is all about — and the book is not finished even today.

Closing Prayer

God, I ask that You would help us to be that right person in the right place at the right time, and give us the words to speak when that time arises. Lord, just as You did with Peter in Acts 2 — what a difference You make in a person by Your Spirit. In John's Gospel we saw Peter warming himself by a fire and crying out, "I don't even know the man." Just about a month and a half later he stood, empowered by Your Spirit, preaching to the same men who crucified You, until they cried out, "What must we do?"

Lord, give us strength. Sometimes we feel like failures, like Peter, almost wanting to go out and weep bitterly over how wretched we may be. Yet You desire to use us as You empower us by Your Spirit. Give us boldness to speak the truth. For every one gathered here tonight, give them an opportunity this week to minister Your grace and truth, to minister the gospel of the risen Lord to those who are sick and dying and need the truth. Help us to see the wide-open door You have laid before us. For we ask it in Jesus' name. Amen.