Acts 1.1-9
The ‘Acts’ material in the Bible was written by Luke. It is a sequel to his gospel account. Luke was a Greek Christian doctor who joined Paul and his team on their missionary journeys. He was an eyewitness of much of what is recorded in Acts. You can tell where Luke was present; for example: Acts 16.6-10
The book of Acts teaches us how the Holy Spirit works with disciples to build the Church. It tells how the first generation of disciples carried on with Jesus’ mission and thus shows the following generations (including ours) how the work of Christ gets done without his physical presence in the world. The book is not a blueprint or template, rather it is evidence and guidance about how we might expect the Spirit of Christ to involve us in his master plan for humanity.
The first point to notice is: Jesus Continued his Work after leaving the world.
Jesus’ life up to his resurrection (i.e. all that was described in Luke’s first book, the gospel of Luke) is said by Luke to be what he BEGAN to do and teach (verse 1). Acts, records the continuation of Jesus’ work after his ascension.
Jesus did not stop working when he removed himself physically from the world. It is true that he works in a different mode to when he was physically present among his disciples – but this is still HIS work. He does not send us out to work independently of him.
Just as the disciples were totally dependent on Jesus’ power, his teaching and his initiatives as they followed him around Israel – so in Acts we discover he is STILL in charge of his work. He hasn’t handed it over to human control or bright ideas. The vision, the ideas and the power to get it done all still come directly from Christ.
Jesus Christ is busy populating his eternal kingdom by calling people out of each successive generation – all over the world. He calls it ‘making disciples’ which, for us, means getting followers for Jesus.
Our big purpose as disciples of Jesus is to spread the good news about him. We do this by being living evidence –giving witness to - the quality of his new life (love, justice, righteousness and wisdom etc). Jesus described this activity as us being light in the dark night of human ignorance about God, and as salt rubbed into an animal carcass to slow the rotting. Jesus said that the gates of hell won’t be able stand against the Church’s rescue mission.
This powerful mission of Jesus could be a significant reason why a Christian feels restless, dissatisfied, aimless and even bored in his or her life: because if you are out of sync with the work of Jesus Christ, you are unplugged from the main purpose and plan for your existence.
Many people are willing to aim for a B-grade life – maybe the four Bs:
a BMW,
a Boat,
and a Bach at the Beach.
Actually most people never even attain even those. The restlessness and hollowness remains because they are unplugged from the greatest business in the universe: The unfailing progress towards the complete uncovering of God’s kingdom. Life is passing them by. And if you are vague about Christ’s mission – life is passing you by, too.
Missing the main point of the main thing is like a person going to Eden Park for the final of the Rugby World Cup, but staying in the carpark to play with the flags on the cars. You hear the cheering from inside the stadium and you briefly wonder what it might be going on in the inside, but you are quickly distracted by your flags – petty, pointless things. A person can never be satisfied and purposeful in life until he or she gets on the inside where you can participate with Jesus Christ.
Believe me: the reason why a life seems pointless and aimless is that it has come unplugged from Christ and his big purpose for the current times and his big purpose for you.
It is a miserable thing to become an ‘almost disciple’. Remember the rich young administrator who couldn’t part with his lifestyle when called to follow Jesus; he went away disappointed that he couldn’t have a foot in both worlds. When you drift away from Christ, you are like man with one foot on the boat and the other on the dock. The dock is solid, it’s going nowhere - so you need to get both feet on solid ground before you drop down into the churning waters.
But beyond this negative warning, there is the positive message from Luke’s opening statement: Jesus was only BEGINNING his action when here in the flesh – there is more to come. There are massive opportunities here and now for you to engage with him in his exciting kingdom-building work. This is why he gives his Holy Spirit: to equip you to work with him – now.
Second point from these opening verses in Acts: Jesus works through the Holy Spirit as he rolls out his kingdom.
I get this from where Luke says that Jesus gave instructions through the Holy Spirit and that the over-arching theme of his instructions – the organising framework – was the Kingdom of God. See in Verse 3, Jesus spent a further 40 days with his disciples, before removing himself physically, and in that time he made certain that they understood that he was genuinely back alive among them – and he spoke with them about the kingdom of God giving instruction through the Holy Spirit.
What does that mean that he instructed them through the Holy Spirit? It means that the Holy Spirit worked in the minds and understandings of his disciples so that they could ‘get’ Christ’s teaching.
You can’t learn about the Kingdom of God – or, learn any useful spiritual truths, without the intervention of the Holy Spirit. Bible learning is not merely an intellectual exercise. You don’t learn from God’s Word by approaching it like a course of study. The Holy Spirit has to support your understanding and bring light to your mind.
The Holy Spirit doesn’t work symbolically or as an illustration of something real. He IS real – when he works he makes promised things happen. When God says, let light shine in the darkness, the Holy Spirit causes light to shine. When Jesus wanted to teach his disciples so they understood the importance and reality of God’s kingdom, he taught them through the Holy Spirit.
When you are confused or unclear what you are supposed to do or think, ASK for the Holy Spirit. Jesus promised that if we ask for the Holy Spirit, God will give him.
Luke 11.11 “Which of you fathers, if your son asks for a fish, will give him a snake instead? 12 Or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion? 13 If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!”
God is not reluctant to give us the assistance of the teacher – the Holy Spirit. He gives him to those who ask – so we can learn and know.
So far, then, we have two important understandings from the beginning of Luke’s book of Acts:
1. Jesus continues to be in charge of his work. He has the plans and the resources for us to fulfil our part in it. This is how we get meaning for our lives. His kingdom-building is something that gathers up all our circumstances, our connections, work, family, abilities, opportunities, trouble and people we have in our lives – and infuses them with meaning and value. He joins us in the body of believers (the Church) and supplies teaching and spiritual gifts so that we can have a share in building up the kingdom that will in due course grind down and supplant all the vain and evil efforts of rebels and the Evil One.
2. Secondly, this work is beyond us personally. We need the Holy Spirit. We need him so we can understand and follow Christ’s instructions. We need him so we have power to carry them out.
Lastly, Jesus intends that his followers be flooded with the Holy Spirit.
Teaching about the Kingdom of God was Jesus’ priority in the last days before he left his disciples (verse 3). This was always his priority. Remember his model prayer: “Our Father who lives in heaven, may your name be held holy. May your kingdom come – your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” In other words, the prime objective of every created thing – especially people (whom God created with the capacity to do things WILLINGLY) is that everything should ‘hallow’ God’s name. That means to confess, and lift up and celebrate that God is holy – gloriously perfect – the highest good – far above all else.
And the way that God’s name and person is held holy is by having his kingdom – his rule and his purposes – being done on earth as it is in heaven. It is no wonder, then, that Jesus was so determined that his followers should work for that purpose.
Jesus made a clear connection between his determination to secure a people who would obey God out of every nation and the work of his disciples as witnesses. At this time he said: “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” Matthew 28
But before his disciples could engage effectively in this grand purpose, they needed to be equipped with power and spiritual gifts by the Holy Spirit. Jesus told his disciples that they had to wait for the baptism of the Holy Spirit, before they made their next moves (verses 4,5). He says that the baptism in water that John introduced was a picture of the real baptism that the Holy Spirit was about cause in their lives.
John’s baptism symbolised some important things:
- Dying to self-directed and self-centred lives
- Confessing the readiness to welcome God’s appointed leader for humankind
- Choosing a totally new purpose and new way of living.
The key idea in baptism is immersion – being totally enveloped into these new realities. Entering a different world. So when Jesus speaks of a baptism with or in the Holy Spirit he was likening it to being plunged under the waters of the Jordan River – he was speaking of being enveloped – fully immersed in the Spirit of God.
This is no toe-dipping experience – this is total surrender, so that their minds, thinking, emotions, bodies and reason for living were to be immersed in the Holy Spirit. This flooding of their lives by the Holy Spirit would be necessary before they could begin to shake the world with the good news.
And, to make it more explicit what the baptism of the Holy Spirit meant, Jesus went on to say that when the Holy Spirit came upon them, they would:
- Receive power directed towards achieving Christ’s purpose.
- This meant becoming his witnesses in an ever-increasing circle of influence from the city of Jerusalem right out to the ends of the earth (New Zealand is the ends of the earth!)
The baptism of the Holy Spirit is like John’s baptism, because it means dying to our old way of living and coming under the influence and rule of Jesus Christ. It is a baptism, because we go right under – there is no part of our lives that the Holy Spirit doesn’t saturate and influence. We are immersed and enveloped in God’s influence for everything. The flooding of our lives by the Holy Spirit is what provides the power to become living evidences of Jesus Christ and spread his influence in widening circles.
As we go on in Luke’s book of Acts, we will see this kind of living in action. Although it has been called the Acts of the Apostles – it might better be called the Acts of the Holy Spirit.
The aim of studying this is to make us dissatisfied with the status quo – with how things are in our individual lives and in our church. To stir up hunger and thirst for more understanding, more power, more evidences of the Holy Spirit flooding through our lives. More evidence of humble, self-denying, God-glorifying living that brings light into dark circumstances and which causes the enemy’s strongholds to crumble and fall. More people meeting Christ in the gospel and beginning the total reforming of their lives in his image.
We should respond by quietly unfastening the floodgates to every corner of our lives and asking God to immerse us, to baptise us with his Holy Spirit - for everything and in every situation. Ultimately we want him to do that for the glory of Christ and the success of his kingdom.
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