Acts 1 (August 27, 2023)

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FBC Travelers Rest sermon from August 27, 2023 by Pastor Rhett Burns.

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Well, you can turn in your Bibles to Acts chapter 1. Acts chapter 1 is this morning we begin going through the book of Acts which with a few breaks here and there will take us into late spring next year.
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And so we are going through the book of Acts, we're still going to go through it at a pretty quick pace even though it's going to take us a good portion of the year to do it.
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This is a book known as the Acts of the Apostles or as my four year old
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Asher down here says it when we're reading Acts around the dinner table, the Acts of the Apostles. And as he'll also tell you it's written by Luke the doctor and it's part two of Luke's work.
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The first part being the gospel of Luke. And so we see that there in the very first verse of Acts 1 it says the former account
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I made O Theophilus of all that Jesus began to do and teach. The former account refers to Luke's gospel, this is part two.
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Luke's gospel tells about Jesus' ministry on earth, all that Jesus began to do and teach until he was taken up.
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And then what Acts does it tells us what Jesus continues to do through his apostles, through his church by the
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Holy Spirit. And so this is the Acts of the
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Apostles but because this is the work of Jesus continued some people will say that they'll call the book the
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Acts of the Ascended Lord and both are true. Because we see the apostles acting here in this book but they're doing so in the name of Jesus and empowered by his spirit thus these are the
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Acts of the Lord as well. Now we're going to go through the book as I mentioned at a fairly quick pace.
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We could break this down in some very small sections because it's packed but it would take us several years to go through Acts at that pace and so we're going to go at about a chapter a week and to do that we're going to have to leave some stuff out.
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Which I hate to do because the Bible is fascinating but that's just part of preaching you have to know what to include and what not to include.
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But because we can't focus on everything I want to highlight a couple of themes that I'm going to give special attention to over the course of our study through the book of Acts and the first theme that we're going to give special attention to is conquering in the name of Christ.
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So this is what I'm titling the series Conquering in the Name of Christ because that is the story of Acts.
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The story of Acts is that Jesus gives the church the Holy Spirit and he sends them out into the world to conquer it in his name and what we'll see especially in the first ten chapters of Acts there's a lot of parallels with the first ten chapters of the book of Joshua.
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And you remember what the book of Joshua was about it was about God sending
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Israel in to take to conquer the promised land and take it from Canaan, the
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Canaanites. And so that's what we see in Joshua and we're going to see parallels in the book of Acts it's about conquering not just the promised land but the entire world.
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So there's a lot of similarities there there's a lot of parallels there we'll try to draw some of those out but there's also some key differences.
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The biggest one is that Israel conquered Canaan by the sword of iron and the church conquers the world by the sword of the
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Spirit which is the word of God. We conquer by preaching and proclaiming the gospel of Jesus Christ and so one theme that we will focus in on as we go through this book one theme is the mission of God to take the world for Jesus and we'll apply that locally because we want to take northern
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Greenville County for Jesus. So we're going to talk about mission but a second theme that is an application that I'm regularly going to try to make as we go through this book and that is the theme of the church in negative world.
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Now I need to explain what I mean by negative world there and I'm taking that phrase from an essay by Aaron Rind that he wrote a couple of years ago that I found very helpful in talking about the cultural shifts that we have witnessed in our nation and so what we're going to do is we're going to apply principles from the book of Acts to our current cultural situation.
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This is one of the recurring applications we'll make as we go through the book of Acts but in that essay
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Rind he developed a taxonomy that he called or a framework that he called the three worlds model.
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So I just want to briefly summarize that as an introduction and then we'll get into Acts 1. This three worlds model it refers to the relationship between the culture and Christianity.
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The culture and Christianity, what that relationship is and so he goes back to the World War II and he says that from World War II to about the beginning of the
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Clinton administration was what he called positive world. This is cultural conditions where Christianity is socially advantageous within the culture.
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There's a positive relationship between the culture and Christianity, Christianity and culture, therefore he calls it positive world.
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Being a Christian was a part of having standing in society at that point, right?
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So if you were an insurance salesman back in the 60s or the 70s it was probably a good idea for you to be a member of the local, you know, church in your town because it would be good for business, it would be part of having standing in society, at that time politicians were expected to be
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Christian, there was a positive relationship there. Then from early 90s to about the end of the
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Obama administration, he says it's neutral world and so in neutral world it was neither socially advantageous nor disadvantageous to be a
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Christian or not to be a Christian. Some people like to play golf, some people like to hunt, some people like to hike, some people like to go to church, just another lifestyle choice, neither good nor bad as far as the cultural viewpoint of being a
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Christian, it was neutral. And then somewhere about 2015 with the
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Supreme Court Obergefell decision, we entered into what he calls negative world and this is where it is disadvantageous to be a
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Christian, it hurts your standing in society, it's bad for business and it's where the culture is predominantly against Christ and the church, there's a negative relationship, negative world.
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So your coastal blue cities got to negative world first, areas like ours, honestly kind of in transition between neutral and negative, we see aspects of both if we look out into our local culture, but we are seeing that negative world more and more and I think this three worlds framework is really helpful to help us understand and give language to what we have witnessed.
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We all have noticed a shift in our culture, right? We sometimes wonder what in the world has happened? This helps us have a framework for what we're witnessing, but we need the
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Bible to help us know what to do about it. We need the Bible to help us know how we are supposed to act, what we are supposed to do in this type of situation, how we are to think, how we are to practice our faith in such a situation.
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And so the church in Acts, the early church in Acts lived in a negative world situation where the cultural climate in Jerusalem in particular, but also as it spreads out, is against the church.
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So what we want to do is we want to take that situation, we want to make some application as we go throughout the book of how we are to worship
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God and win glory for King Jesus in our current situation. How we are to worship God and win glory for King Jesus in negative world.
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So that's one of the applications we're going to make. Now, with that introduction in our minds, let's read
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God's word together. Acts chapter 1. I'm just going to go through it. I'm just going to read the whole chapter and then we'll go through it.
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But let's hear the word of God to us beginning in Acts chapter 1. The former account I made,
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O Theophilus, of all that Jesus began to do and teach, until the day in which he was taken up, after he, through the
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Holy Spirit, had given commandments to the apostles whom he had chosen, and to whom he had also presented himself alive after his suffering by many infallible proofs, being seen by them during the forty days, and speaking of the things pertaining to the kingdom of God.
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And being assembled together with them, he commanded them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the promise of the
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Father, which he said, You have heard from me. For John truly baptized with water, but you shall be baptized with the
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Holy Spirit not many days from now. Therefore, when he had come together, they asked him, saying,
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Lord, will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel? And he said to them, It is not for you to know the times or the seasons which the
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Father has put in his own authority, but you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you shall be witnesses to me in Jerusalem, and in all
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Judea, and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth. Now when he had spoken these things while they watched, he was taken up, and a cloud received him out of their sight.
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And while they looked steadfastly toward heaven as he went up, behold, two men stood by them in white apparel, who also said,
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Men of Galilee, why do you stand gazing up into heaven? This same Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will so come in like manner as you saw him go into heaven.
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Then they returned to Jerusalem, from the mount called Olivet, which is near Jerusalem, a
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Sabbath day's journey. And when they had entered, they went up into the upper room where they were staying,
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Peter, James, John, Andrew, Philip, Thomas, Bartholomew, Matthew, James the son of Alphaeus, and Simon the
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Zealot, and Judas the son of James. These all continued with one accord in prayer and supplication with the women, and Mary the mother of Jesus, and with his brothers.
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And in those days Peter stood up in the midst of the disciples all together, the number of names was about a hundred and twenty, and he said,
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Men and brethren, this scripture had to be fulfilled, which the Holy Spirit spoke before by the mouth of David concerning Judas, who became a guide to those who arrested
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Jesus, for he was numbered with us and obtained a part in this ministry. Now this man purchased a field with the wages of iniquity, and falling headlong he burst open in the middle, and all his entrails gushed out, and it became known to all those dwelling in Jerusalem, so that this field is called in their own language,
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Achel Damah, that is, field of blood. For it is written in the book of Psalms, Let his dwelling place be desolate, and let no one live in it, and let another take his office.
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Therefore of these men who have accompanied us all the time that the Lord Jesus went in and out among us, beginning from the baptism of John to that day when he was taken up from us, one of these must become a witness with us of his resurrection.
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And they proposed to Joseph called Barsabbas, who was surnamed Justus and Matthias, and they prayed and said,
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You, O Lord, who know the hearts of all, show which of these you have chosen to take part in this ministry, an apostleship from which
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Judas by transgression fell, that he might go to his own place.
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And they cast their lots, and the lot fell on Matthias, and he was numbered with the eleven apostles."
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Amen. And this is the word of God to us this morning. First thing
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I want you to notice is that the first eleven verses just retell the last seven or so verses of the gospel of Luke, Luke 24, verses 47 to 53, or something like that.
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It's a restatement. So you have the first part of Luke, and the first part of Acts, and the end of one, and the beginning of the other, and just kind of bleed over, and he summarizes what happened during the forty days between the resurrection and the ascension.
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And we see in verse three that Jesus, what he's doing that time, he's teaching them about the kingdom of God. And then down in verse six we see that they ask him if he will at this time restore the kingdom to Israel.
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And so we begin this book of Acts with a question of the kingdom. We begin with a question of the kingdom.
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For you see, after hundreds of years, they are ready to cast off the yoke of Roman occupation of their land.
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They're ready to be done with that. But Jesus doesn't, when they ask him in verse six if he's going to restore the kingdom to Israel at this time,
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Jesus doesn't answer them directly. Rather, he says, it's not for you to know the times or the seasons, which the
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Father has put in his own authority. And then he shifts the focus from Israel and broadens it to include not just Jerusalem, not just Judea, not just Samaria, but the ends of the earth.
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He broadens it from Israel to the ends of the earth. The scope of mission is widened.
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We see that in verse eight, but you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you and you shall be witnesses to me in Jerusalem and all
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Judea and Samaria to the ends of the earth. You see, Jesus doesn't answer their question, but he instead gives them a mission.
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It wasn't for them to know the times of the season when God is going to do this or that. Instead, what you do have is a mission to be witnesses in all the earth.
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He doesn't answer their question, instead gives them a mission, which is to take the world for Jesus, starting with Jerusalem and going out.
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And he also gives them empowerment for this mission. He gives them, he's going to give them the
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Holy Spirit. We see that next week in Acts chapter two, but he mentions it here in verse four, but wait for the promise of the
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Father that you have heard from me. That's the
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Holy Spirit. So, they're living in negative world under Roman occupation. They're living in negative world with the
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Jewish leaders against them and the cultural consensus of the unbelieving
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Jews is against them and they want deliverance and instead Jesus gives them a job.
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He says, preach, proclaim, be witnesses to me to the ends of the earth.
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He gives them a job. He gives them a mission. You see, sometimes Christians today get discouraged with our current cultural situation.
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They see how things have changed and it is very discouraging and they think that the world must be ending soon and they just want
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Jesus to come back and set up heaven on earth and let's just be done with the whole thing. We want rescue, we want deliverance, but it's not for us to know times or seasons.
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We don't know. What it is for us to do is to get busy on the work of mission.
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It is for us to get busy on the work of mission and that mission is to take the world for Jesus. The kingdom is broader than the disciples were thinking.
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It's not just for Israel, but it's for the ends of the earth. That is why we are here worshiping because we have been the ends of the earth that the gospel has come to and we are to take what we have received and continue that mission.
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In effect, Jesus' answer to them asking about when will you restore the kingdom to Israel?
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His answer is, the kingdom is the world and go conquer it in my name. And then, he leaves.
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When we go to verse 9, after he tells them, he just leaves. This might seem like an inopportune time for the leader to leave, but we will come back to that in just a minute.
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But let me read. It says, Now when he had spoken these things, while they watched, he was taken up in a cloud and received out of their sight.
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He ascended into heaven at that moment. Now we might think that this is pretty poor timing, right?
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We are to go take the world for Jesus and Jesus ascends. But we will remember what Jesus told the disciples and that is that it would be better for them if he left.
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It would be better for them if he left because the spirit would come. You see, Jesus took on human flesh.
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Jesus from now and forever is fully God and fully man. He was resurrected in the body and as man he could only be in one place at one time.
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The spirit, however, would indwell all believers as they multiplied and filled the earth and spread out over the earth and the work of Jesus would continue through his people who are indwelled with his spirit and it would continue to the ends of the earth and to the end of time.
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And so Jesus left. That doesn't mean he doesn't care about the world anymore. Rather when he ascends into heaven, this is when he is enthroned over all the world.
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This is when he receives the kingdom in order to rule the world.
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Now he won his kingdom by his death and his resurrection. Say that in Romans chapter 1, by his resurrection.
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So that's when he won the world but he was crowned as king, formally installed as king at his ascension.
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This is his coronation. We see and we read about it in Daniel chapter 7 verses 13 and 14.
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Let me read those verses. Where Daniel was watching in the night visions and behold, one like the son of man, coming with the clouds of heaven.
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Sound familiar with Acts chapter 1 where he's taken up in the clouds? Notice the direction here in Daniel chapter 7, coming with the clouds of heaven.
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He came to the ancient of days. The ancient of days, God the Father. And so what we're reading about in Daniel chapter 7 is the son of man coming on the clouds to heaven, to the throne room, to the ancient of days.
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And they brought him near before him. Then to him was given dominion and glory and a kingdom that all peoples, nations and languages should serve him.
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His dominion is an everlasting dominion which shall not pass away and his kingdom the one which shall not be destroyed.
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Daniel has a vision of what is happening at the ascension of Christ. What Daniel saw in his vision happened when
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Jesus was taken up from the Mount of Olives here in verse 9 of Acts chapter 1. And the result is what we read about in Ephesians chapter 1 verses 20 through 23 when it says
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God raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places. Remember that, at the right hand in the heavenly places, far above all principality and power and might and dominion and every name that is named, not only in this age but also in that which is to come.
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And he put all things under his feet and he gave him to be the head over all things to the church which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all.
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What we see is Jesus is enthroned, Jesus is ruling, Jesus is reigning,
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Jesus is above all things, all beings right now. Jesus is currently ruling and reigning and this ought to give us hope, this ought to fill you with encouragement, it ought to embolden you, it ought to put some fire in your belly because Jesus is king right now.
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Satan no longer has dominion on this earth for the fullness of the earth belongs to Christ.
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It is his realm now. We are not waiting for Jesus to be king one day in the future.
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He is king right now because he ascended on the clouds to the ancient of days where it was given to him dominion and glory and a kingdom which shall not be destroyed.
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But his rule is mediated. His rule is mediated, that is he rules through his representatives on earth who are empowered by his spirit.
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His rule goes through his people who are filled with his spirit, he rules through the church.
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This is what we see in the rest of the book of Acts. The mission of Christ being continued through the apostles and through the church.
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The book of Acts is about transition from Jesus to the apostles to the church.
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From the ministry of Christ to the ministry of Christ through the spirit. And the connection with the spirit here is interesting because if you remember reading in your old testament, the kings of Israel were said to have the spirit.
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This was of course pre -Pentagos, so this was before the spirit fell, right? But the kings had the spirit upon them, and so you remember when
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David when he prayed after he had sinned, he said, cast not your holy spirit from me.
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It was a plea to keep the kingdom, it was a plea for the kingship not to be taken from him like it had been taken from Saul.
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And now every believer has the spirit. Every believer has the spirit upon them and Ephesians 2 tells us that we are seated with Christ, do you remember where it says we are seated with Christ?
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In the heavenly places. Ephesians 2 says we are seated with Christ in the heavenly places. And where from Ephesians 1 do we know that Christ is in the heavenly places?
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He's at the right hand of God, he's at the place of rule. We are seated with Christ at the right hand of God, spiritually speaking, where we rule and reign with Christ because we have the spirit.
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We're there with him. That means Christ rules through us, Christ rules through the church, his rule is mediated through the church, empowered by the spirit.
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And the book of Acts tells us the story of the transition of Jesus in the flesh to the work of Jesus by the spirit through the church.
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And so what we see is that Jesus is, Ephesians 1 says, he's head of the church, and what happens to the head happens to the body.
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What happens to the head happens to the body. You think of it like diving in a swimming pool, if you dive in, your head goes in first, what happens to the body?
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The body follows the head. We're going to see that. What we read about in Luke and the other gospels that happen to Jesus happens to the church in the book of Acts.
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Let me show you that theme from Luke's gospel in Acts, I'm drawing from Alistair Roberts' commentary here.
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We see the baptism of Jesus in Luke 3, we see the baptism of the church in Acts 2. The spirit descends as a dove on Jesus at his baptism, the spirit descends as divided tongues of fire on the church at Pentecost in Acts 2.
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Jesus is rejected at Nazareth, his hometown, in Luke 4. The apostles are rejected in Jerusalem in Acts 3 -5.
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Herod Antipas attempts to kill Jesus in Luke 13. Herod Agrippa attempts to kill
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Peter in Acts 12. Jesus preached the gospel to outcasts in Luke 14 -18.
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The apostles preached the gospel to the Gentiles in Acts 13 -20. We see
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Jesus journeying to Jerusalem in the end of Acts. We see Paul journeying to Jerusalem. Jesus faces trials, several trials before governors and kings.
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Paul faces several trials before governors and kings. Jesus died and was raised. Paul at the end of Acts experiences a symbolic death at sea, we'll get to that when we get to the end of Acts, and a resurrection in Acts 28, symbolically.
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Likewise we see similar healings and miracles in the ministries of Jesus and the ministries of the apostles.
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And we see Stephen die a cruciform death like Jesus, a death like Jesus.
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The point here is that the church carries on the mission of Christ, and what happened to the head happens to the body.
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That means we are to live Christ -shaped lives. We are the body of Christ. We are to follow
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Christ. So you too are baptized. You too will face opposition. You too can proclaim the gospel of Christ.
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You too will suffer. You too will die. You too will be resurrected and raised to new life, because you too have the
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Spirit of God. You too are to carry on the mission of Jesus.
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Now that Jesus' rule is mediated through His people helps us make sense of the last part of chapter 1, where we see special attention being given to God's people on earth.
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We see lists of names who were there. We see apostles. We see where they need to replace an apostle.
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We see the number of disciples that are gathered. You see in verse 12, they return to Jerusalem, obeying
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Jesus where He said, do not depart from Jerusalem yet. It would have made more sense for them to go to Galilee, the Galileans go to Galilee. The opposition in Jerusalem made more sense for them to go elsewhere, but Jesus told them to go to Jerusalem.
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So they returned. We see in verse 12. And when we read there, we have the list of the apostles.
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They are joined by women, including Mary, the mother of Jesus, and His brothers. And there are 120 disciples at names.
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Now the numbers there are important. One we see, the number 120, that's 12, the number of the tribes of Israel, the number of the apostles, times 10.
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So what we have is a symbolic restored Israel, a restored people of God.
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There in the 120 disciples. But if you notice, you see the list of apostles, we only have 11, supposed to have 12, we only have 11.
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That's a problem. Because on the day of Pentecost, they need to be fully represented. They only have 11 because Judas abdicated his office when he betrayed
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Jesus. But to fully represent the restored tribes, the restored people of God, you need 12 apostles at Pentecost.
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So Peter stands up among them, and he quotes from the Psalms, and says, Let another take his office. And if you look down in verses 21 -26, he says, you know, among those who have been with us the whole time, from the baptism of John until the ascension of Jesus, from among those, we need to choose one.
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They proposed two, Joseph and Matthias. And they prayed and said, God, you,
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O Lord who know the hearts of all, show which of these two you have chosen to take part in this ministry. And then they cast their lots, and the lot fell on Matthias, and he was numbered with the 11 apostles.
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I want to note just a few things here. One is that God chose the replacement apostle.
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He had chosen the original 12, and he's going to choose the one to replace Judas. But if you keep on reading in Acts, we'll see this.
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When it comes time later in Acts, and later in the New Testament, to appoint elders for the church, or pastors for the church, those two words are used interchangeably in the
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New Testament, elders and pastors. When it came time to appoint elders or pastors for the church, God did not appoint them.
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The apostles did when they first planted the church, and then later the church would appoint its own pastors. And so here, what we see is a transition.
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This is the theme in Acts, the transition from Jesus to the church by the Spirit. So the transition from the acts of Jesus, choosing the apostles, to the acts of the church, choosing the pastors.
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The third thing I want you to notice here is that they cast lots. They cast lots.
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Now this was a common practice, kind of like rolling dice, it was a common practice to discern the will of God.
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Read about it multiple times in the Old Testament, and God used it.
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But I want you to notice something. If you flip over that page, and you read the rest of the New Testament, you will not find one instance of anybody casting lots, approvingly.
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God's people don't cast lots anymore, because in Acts 2, the Spirit comes. In Acts 2, they receive the
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Spirit, and after the Spirit comes, God's people are no longer to cast lots. Rather, God's people are to use wisdom and discernment by the
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Spirit, informed and shaped by God's Word, in order to make decisions.
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There's a maturing of the people of God here. We are now endowed with the Spirit, and dwelled by the
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Spirit, and we are called to wisdom then. Bible -shaped, Bible -informed, Bible -saturated, wisdom, judgment, and rule, empowered by the
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Spirit of God. That's what we're called for, because we're seated with Christ in the heavenlies. I want to end with one encouragement for life in a negative world.
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I want to end with one encouragement for life in a negative world, where it seems that our enemies are winning the day.
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It can be discouraging to look and see that, right? In the account of Judas, there's a warning to those who oppose
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God's kingdom. There's a warning to those who oppose God's kingdom. If you read verses 18 and 19, to be honest with you, they're kind of gruesome, right?
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Now, this man, Talmud Judas, purchased a field with the wages of iniquity, and falling headlong, he burst open in the middle, and his entrails gushed out, and it became known as the field of blood.
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It's kind of gruesome, right? It's a warning to those who oppose God's kingdom. And then we see that Peter, right after that, he quotes from an imprecatory psalm.
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Now, an imprecatory psalm is one, a psalm that invokes the cursing, the curse of God upon the unrighteous and the wicked.
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We don't often like to deal with the imprecatory psalms today, but they're in the Bible. In the
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New Testament, Peter here quotes from one, saying, "...let
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his dwelling be desolate, and let no one live in it." The lesson here, as Roberts puts it, is there are fatal consequences for those who oppose
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God's spirit and His kingdom. Earlier, during the pastoral prayer, praying for those in authority over us, praying blessing for their obedience, and that God would shatter their teeth if they disobey.
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Why? Because that's how the Bible teaches us to pray. There are warnings, there are consequences for those who would oppose
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God's spirit and God's kingdom. We'll see this throughout the book of Acts, in the death of Ananias and Sapphira, in Acts 5.
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We'll see it with the cursing of the sorcerers Simon and Elmas, later in Acts.
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We see it with the defeat of the seven sons of Sceva. And so, in the warning to the unrighteous, in a warning to the wicked, the righteous, the godly, can find great hope for life in a negative world.
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And that is that Jesus will place every enemy under His feet.
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Judas did not betray Jesus and succeed. Judas did not betray
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Jesus and thrive. Judas did not betray Jesus and it go well for him.
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He betrayed Christ and he was defeated. And Jesus will put every enemy under His feet.
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He must reign, 1 Corinthians 15 tells us, until He puts every enemy under His feet. He will subdue every nation that rages against Him.
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He will judge the wicked servants. The wicked will not ultimately prosper or succeed. Their plans will falter and their plans will come to nothing because Jesus will conquer for He is
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King. And every knee will bow and every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is
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Lord to the glory of God the Father. And united to Him, united to Christ by faith, we will conquer too.
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In His name and for His glory. Let's pray. Our Father, I pray that You would empower us for mission.
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That by faith and the proclamation of the gospel of Jesus Christ, that we would live in such a way, speak in such a way, to be a part of Your work,
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Your Spirit's work on earth, Your church's work on earth, that we may conquer in the name of Christ and win glory for King Jesus in whose name we pray.