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Introduction to Acts (The Continuing Adventures of Jesus #1)

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INTRODUCTION

The book of Acts has often been called “The Acts of the Apostles,” which is certainly what the book describes, primarily beginning with Peter in Jerusalem and then following Paul’s missionary journeys all the way to where the book ends in Rome. But many commentators have pointed out that it is particularly the Holy Spirit who empowers and drives the ministry of the Apostles, and so others have suggested a revised title “The Acts of the Holy Spirit,” which is also good and helpful. But if we read the first sentence of Acts, Luke seems to have yet another layer in mind: these are the Acts and Words of Jesus continued.

The opening line of Acts also highlights the nature of the book: it’s a book of action and words, adventures and messages: from jailbreaks to shipwrecks to sermons, miracles, baptisms in the middle of the night, mobs, beatings, and conspiracies, it ranks among the most fast-paced adventure stories of the Bible. And Luke is teaching us that these adventures are what Jesus does through His Spirit, working through His people.

THE TEXT

“The former treatise have I made, O Theophilus, of all that Jesus began both to do and teach…” (Acts 1:1-3)

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

This is the “beloved physician” (Col. 4:14) Luke’s second book on the acts and teaching of Jesus (Acts 1:1, Lk. 1:1-4). As in that first account, Luke is particularly concerned with eye-witness testimony that confirms the certainty of the Christian message (cf. Lk. 1:2-3). “Theophilus” means “lover of God” or “beloved of God,” and therefore, it works as a generic title for any believer, but the formal address of “most excellent” suggests that Luke may have had a particular man in mind as well (Acts 1:1, Lk. 1:4).

Luke’s first volume recounted what Jesus began to do and teach until He was taken up (Acts 1:2). But He wasn’t taken up into Heaven until He had given commandments by the Holy Spirit to His apostles, whom He had personally chosen previously (Acts 1:2, cf. Lk. 6:13-16). It was to those apostles in particular that He proved Himself alive after His death by many signs (Acts 1:3). In fact, He showed Himself alive for forty days between His resurrection and ascension, giving signs and teaching them the things concerning the kingdom of God (Acts 1:3).

THE KINGDOM OF GOD

John Calvin says that during these forty days, Jesus “briefly set down the end of the doctrine of the gospel; namely, that God may reign in us. Regeneration is the beginning of this kingdom, and the end thereof is blessed immortality; the middle proceedings are in a more ample going forward and increase of regeneration.” The reign of God begins in the capture of the capital city of a man and its complete surrender, and it proceeds until the whole country is subdued to His righteousness and holiness. He who begins that kind of work always completes it (Phil. 1:6). This is the central adventure of Christian faith: submitting to Jesus wherever He leads.

The book of Acts begins and ends with this message of the “kingdom.” The book closes: “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). Closely related to the “kingdom” theme are the last two words of the book in Greek: parresia and akolutos. The word parresia means “boldness,” and akolutos means “unhindered.” We will return to these words throughout our study of the book of Acts, but suffice it to say for now: these are the hallmarks of the Kingdom of God. Citizens of the Kingdom are bold and unstoppable, and this is because Jesus reigns in them. We will see throughout our study that every attempt to stop the gospel failed: prisons, stoning, persecution, mockery, mobs, lies, even the sins of God’s people. At every point, King Jesus broke through, and the mission continued boldly and unhindered.

WORD & DEED

The other thing Acts emphasizes and Luke underlines here in the opening is the unity of word and deed. Jesus is our Savior and Lord by His actions and His teaching (Acts 1:1). He proclaimed the gospel with all authority, and then He accomplished the gospel with all authority. He proclaimed the authority to forgive of sins, to cast out demons, and to raise the dead, and then He suffered for our sins, destroyed the power of the Devil on the cross, and rose from the dead. This is also the mark of all faithful Christian leaders. Jesus warned against the scribes and Pharisees, telling His disciples that they ought to do what they teach but not what they do (Mt. 23:3). “For they bind heavy burdens and grievous to be borne, and lay them on men’s shoulders; but they themselves will not move them with one of their fingers” (Mt. 23:3). Faithful leaders, like Jesus, lead by action and prove their teaching by their lives.

The Christian faith is not merely a religion of words; nor is it merely a religion of deeds. It is a religion of word and deed, faith and action, doctrine and signs. This begins with faith and obedience: we are justified by faith alone, but we are justified by a living and fruitful faith that always works by love (Gal. 5:6, Js. 2:17-26). As Jesus says, “Why call ye me, Lord, Lord, and do not do the things which I say?” (Lk. 6:46) Is Jesus Lord? Is He King? Has He purchased you with His precious blood? Isn’t He worthy? Obedience to King Jesus is the greatest adventure.

CONCLUSIONS

The book of Acts is addressed to the “lover of God” or the “beloved of God.” And there’s no one who loves God, except those who are loved by God first (1 Jn. 4:10). But the love of God is no tame, inanimate thing. It was Augustine who put into words what seems implied everywhere in Scripture: the Holy Spirit is the love of God, the love of the Father and the Son. This love of God is poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit (Rom. 5:5).

But the Holy Spirit is the creativity of God, the power of God, the wisdom of God, the fierce loyalty and kindness of God: think of Creation, Noah, Bezalel, Samson, Ezekiel, Mary, Pentecost. This is no tame Spirit, no tame love. This Love is full of life, adventure, joy, and action. Acts is a record of the bold and unhindered Spirit-Love of Christ driving, compelling, pressing His people forward into the Kingdom, compelling the whole world to come with us.

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The God of Bountiful Harvests (Authentic Ministry #20)

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INTRODUCTION

One of the great lessons that we must learn is that God is far more generous than we are. Often, when we are confronted with scarcity, it is the result of our own greed, laziness, unbelief, and so on. When this starts to happen, we clutch at what we have even more, which perpetuates the downward cycle. God is the God of abundance, and the thing that corrupts the resultant affluence is something that we call sin.

THE TEXT

“For as touching the ministering to the saints, it is superfluous for me to write to you: For I know the forwardness of your mind, for which I boast of you to them of Macedonia, that Achaia was ready a year ago; and your zeal hath provoked very many. Yet have I sent the brethren, lest our boasting of you should be in vain in this behalf; that, as I said, ye may be ready: Lest haply if they of Macedonia come with me, and find you unprepared, we (that we say not, ye) should be ashamed in this same confident boasting. Therefore I thought it necessary to exhort the brethren, that they would go before unto you, and make up beforehand your bounty, whereof ye had notice before, that the same might be ready, as a matter of bounty, and not as of covetousness. But this I say, He which soweth sparingly shall reap also sparingly; and he which soweth bountifully shall reap also bountifully. Every man according as he purposeth in his heart, so let him give; not grudgingly, or of necessity: for God loveth a cheerful giver” (2 Corinthians 9:1–7).

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

Paul says that on one level it is unnecessary for him to go again over his teaching on finances and giving to the saints (v. 1). They were very eager to give the year before, and Paul had bragged on them to the Macedonians, which is part of the reason they were provoked into zealous generosity (v. 2). But Paul sent these brothers on ahead to make sure the gift was ready because otherwise it would look like Paul had been boasting in vain (v. 3). The issue was not the donation itself, but rather whether the donation was prepared and ready to go (v. 4). Imagine the humiliation if the raggedy Macedonians showed up in Corinth with their big gift, and the well-to-do Corinthians had to say, “Oh, yeah, we said we would do that, didn’t we?” So this is why Paul sent on the brothers mentioned in the previous chapter. He knew that if the gift was unprepared, there would be a temptation to try to squeeze it out of them, and that would be covetousness and not bounty (v. 5). The word rendered gift in this section is literally blessing. And Paul then comes down to the central principle—money is seed corn, and the amount of the harvest is directly correlated to the amount that was sown (v. 6). Sow sparingly, reap sparingly—sow generously, reap generously. This is not just a matter of amounts, but also of attitudes. Each donor should settle the amount to be given in his own heart, and then give that amount. He is responsible to monitor that—no grudging, no crisis giving (necessity), and why? God loves a cheerful giver (v. 7).

ZERO SUM THINKING

The thing that paralyzes us is our blind faith in the static and fixed nature of the created world. This leads to zero sum thinking, which in turn leads to a grasping selfishness. Unlearning this zero sum mentality is the hardest thing in the world—in order to do it, you have to mortify envy, lust, greed, and all the rest of that rancid crew.

Zero sum thinking assumes that the size of the pie is necessarily fixed, and that more for someone else means less for you, and that more invested in the soil means less for you, and that more given to kingdom work means less for you. Because there is always the same amount of stuff, the more people we have, the poorer we get. But God has placed us in a world where the pie is constantly growing. Envy stares malevolently at the percentages, and not at the goodness of abundance. But what would you rather have? One percent of a million dollars, or fifty percent of fifty cents?

We have been taught to view everyone as consumers. Why not producers? We are born into this world with only one mouth, and with two hands. Why shouldn’t we produce twice as much as we consume? “In a multitude of people is a king’s honor, but in the lack of people is the downfall of a prince” (Proverbs 14:28).

GENERATING THE GRUDGE

One of the ways that recipients of donations get around what Paul is teaching here is that they do the manipulative thing, and then add a note that says that God wants the person to give the gift that was wheedled out of them, and to give it cheerfully (hilaros). In other words, they disobey the assigned preconditions for this generosity, and then demand that the donor ignore the fact that they did so.

It is like those who invent draconian sabbath restrictions in order to turn the joy of sabbath rest into the equivalent of eating a bowl of driveway gravel, and then, when somebody protests the treatment, they are lugubriously and solemnly informed that God wants us to learn how to call the sabbath a delight (Is. 58:13).

Demand for generosity (emotional demand, authoritative, or other) quenches the desire to do any such thing. This is a principle that applies in multiple areas. Nobody wants to pitch in to help out the dispensers of buzzkill.

WHAT GOD IS LIKE

Our God is a generous God. When He summons us to a life of generosity, He is not trying to squeeze riches from us to fill up His coffers. He doesn’t need us that way. “If I were hungry, I would not tell thee: For the world is mine, and the fulness thereof” (Psalm 50:12). He summons us to generosity so that we might become like Him. His requirement that we learn to give is a form of giving to us.

“Therefore be imitators of God as dear children” (Ephesians 5:1).

“Thanks be to God for His indescribable gift!” (2 Corinthians 9:15).

We worship the God of the open hand. In order to see that open hand, we must look to the gift that was given to us in Christ. And when we look at that open hand, what we see is a nail scar. Sacrificial giving is the way of the Christ because it was the way of Christ.

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The Glory of Being (Biblical Sexuality Sunday 2023)

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INTRODUCTION

Last year Canada passed the C4 bill. It put churches and pastors in the crosshairs by penalizing attempts to confront or contest the GQBLT dogma. Similar legislation is being considered throughout the US and elsewhere. A group of Canadian pastors invited churches around the world to join them in setting aside this Sunday as both a formal protest of these rebellious laws, and an affirmation of Biblical Sexuality. Some might object and say that the pulpit isn’t the appropriate place for such a political topic. But the answer to that is that the pulpit is the battleground for all politics. For it’s here where we declare that Christ is King, His Word is truth, and we are summon all men everywhere to faith, repentance, and obedience.

THE TEXT

For in him we live, and move, and have our being; as certain also of your own poets have said, For we are also his offspring. Forasmuch then as we are the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the Godhead is like unto gold, or silver, or stone, graven by art and man’s device. And the times of this ignorance God winked at; but now commandeth all men every where to repent: Because he hath appointed a day, in the which he will judge the world in righteousness by that man whom he hath ordained; whereof he hath given assurance unto all men, in that he hath raised him from the dead (Act 17:28-31).

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

The Apostle Paul, in his sermon to the Athenians on Mars’ Hill, has provoked them with rebuking their idolatry and superstition. He goes on to proclaim to them the Unknown God which they sought to appease. While their conscience bore witness to this God, Paul sets forth, in the plain words of the Gospel, the God they knew was there.

From this God we receive our life, live our life, and sustain our life (v28). Even the pagan poet Aratus could tell you that (v28). God has made us, not we ourselves (Ps. 100:3). This should make it plain that God isn’t found in our carvings. Whether those carvings were, like in ancient times, in the form of gold, marble, or wood, or in our own time in the form of plastic surgery, hormone treatments, and Instagram filters (v29).

Those who worship the creation are ignorant (literally agnostics). But God, in His patience, bore with mankind until the day His redeeming purposes had fully come; we now live in dawning of that day and all men are summoned to repentance (v30). The reason for this repentance is that God has appointed a day of worldwide judgement. God has appointed a man to sit as judge, presiding over this global judgement. The man ordained as God’s judge is the man who once died but God raised from the dead: Jesus (v31).

THE BODILY RESURRECTION

Notice Paul’s tactic. Rampant idolatry is confronted with the bodily resurrection of the Incarnate God. We live in a world which is governed by a man, a resurrected & glorified man. Christ is bodily at the Father’s right hand. This confronts modern idolaters with (at least) two problems.

First, it rebukes the escapist fantasies brought to us by the digital age (but whose taproot reaches further back into ancient mystery religions). Second, it reaffirms God’s creational decree that all He made was good, not icky as the gnostics imagined.

God declared His creation good; even after the first man shipwrecked the world by sin, God set about to rescue man & all creation from the wreckage. God saw all He’d made and it was very good. The resurrection is God repossessing His creation from Satan’s dominion, and restoring it to the creational good.

Idolaters want the world to be other than it is. They want a god of convenience. A god which holds up a mirror so man can admire himself. A world that is infinitely malleable to whatever whim or vice predominates. Modern ideas of sexuality & gender are nothing less than a reanimation of the corpse of ancient idolatries. The gods still lust for blood. The worshippers of sexual fulfillment as the greatest good carve themselves (and their unborn offspring) to appease these gods. Meanwhile, the priests of the pharmaceutical companies gladly line their pockets with the tribute of the devout.

The resurrection is the gavel summoning all mankind to live in the good world God made, and live in it as He made it.

THE WONDER OF MUNDANE

While the symptoms of our cultural idolatry are plain to see, underneath the skin the central corruption is that of ingratitude. Sheer, willful ingratitude.

The heavens declare God’s glory. The trees applaud their maker. The hills stand aside out of reverence for the approach of their Lord. Rocks would break forth in praise. The lightning & thunder provide the stage lights and the soundtrack for the divine drama, while the clouds are a celestial fog machine creating a show beyond anything Broadway can produce.

For all this, mankind has opted to not only complain that he wasn’t made some other way, but he has refused to note that his very being is a gift. This is what Paul is getting at in the text. God made us, and all things, and this should lead us to humble reverence before our Maker and Judge. It should lead us to see glory in patterns of the wood-grain & the galaxies, the wonder of microwaves, and the miracle of music.

The “there-ness” of creation is intended to lead us to bend the knee in worship, forsaking all idols, forsaking all manner of remaking the world according to our grasping lusts. Modern sexuality identity dogma insists on defiantly asking, “Why am I thus?” As Isaiah points out there is immense silliness in pots poising themselves as critics of the potters.

THE REBELLION RUNS DEEP

One avenue where Christians can make incursions against the gender madness which has possessed our culture is an appeal to the fifth commandment. Here is Paul’s recitation of it in Eph. 6:2 “Honour thy father and mother; (which is the first commandment with promise.”

The fifth commandment poses a real hurdle for those who would set about to redefine gender & sexuality while also trying to maintain any semblance of fidelity to Scripture. Notice what is presupposed in this commandment: male & female, covenantal union, and hierarchical duty.

These are the precise things which men, given over to their lusts, have laid siege to. Rebelling against the 1st & 2nd commandment will lead to breaking the 5th commandment. This commandment not only presupposes these vital creational truths, it forces us to either affirm that God’s law is holy, good, and wise and thus submit to both the explicit command and the implicit creational good, or else adopt the serpent’s line of questioning: did God really say?

This is why faith in the resurrected Christ, followed by Spirit-born obedience is a potent refutation of the lies which surround us. Faithful fathers and mothers, nurturing their children in the fear and admonition of the Lord, are a shield-wall against the madness. God made fathers, and mothers, and this is how we each came into being, by God’s decree. You didn’t come into being outside of the story, but as part of a long line of stories. Trying to live outside this story is to live in the madness of nightmares.

GOD MADE YOU

The application is this. God made you. And God made all things. Combat the lies by looking to the cross. There is a man. A male human. There He is bleeding. There He is enduring the wrath of God for all your damned idolatries, all your lusts, your puffed up pride, every bitter gripe, every sexual kink. He did it all to redeem the world. Including you. All of you.

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A Snake-Handling Church (Authentic Ministry #19)

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INTRODUCTION

When preachers preach about money, it is too often the case that they focus on how the rank-and-file believers ought to be handling their money. But if we follow the lead of Scripture, and especially Paul, we will find ourselves talking about how preachers ought to collect money. And how they ought not to.

THE TEXT

“And herein I give my advice: for this is expedient for you, who have begun before, not only to do, but also to be forward a year ago. Now therefore perform the doing of it; that as there was a readiness to will, so there may be a performance also out of that which ye have. For if there be first a willing mind, it is accepted according to that a man hath, and not according to that he hath not . . .” (2 Corinthians 8:10–24).

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

Against the background of “get to, not got to,” Paul is now willing to give some advice on giving to the Corinthians, who had a year before indicated their eagerness to give (v. 10). As you were willing a year ago, now would be a good time to execute on that commitment (v. 11). Paul wants them to give from what they have (v. 11), and he lays down the principle—if there is a willing mind, God reckons the gift according to the resources available (v. 12). Remember the widow’s mites (Mark 12:42). Paul’s intention is not to burden them in order to ease others (v. 13). The principle is one of reciprocity—what goes around comes around. He wants their current abundance to be a blessing for the saints in Jerusalem, and another time it can run the other way. This is what Paul means by equality (v. 14). He then quotes Ex. 16:18, where in the gathering of the manna there was always enough (v. 15). Paul then returns to the eagerness of Titus to return to Corinth (v. 16). He was exhorted to go back to Corinth, but he didn’t require persuasion (v. 17). Paul then introduces two (unnamed) brothers. The first is a famous brother (v. 18), of great reputation among the churches, and elected by them to escort the gift to Jerusalem (v. 19). The reason is so that everything might be above reproach (v. 20), doing what is prudent and honest in the sight of both God and man (v. 21; Prov. 3:4). Paul then mentions a man we might call the “earnest brother.” Paul knew him, and apparently had selected him, but both men in v. 23 are called messengers (lit. apostles) of the churches, and so they both had official status. Paul then strongly commends all three men to the Corinthians (v. 23). This passage then concludes with Paul exhorting the Corinthians to show these men the proof of their love, and for them to vindicate Paul’s boasting on their behalf (v. 24).

THE MONEY TRAP

There is an old warning for Christian leaders that cautions them about the 3 G’s—glory, gold, and girls. This portion of 2 Corinthians is about the gold. A story is told of a time when Thomas Aquinas called upon the pope, and came in upon him when the pontiff was counting out a large sum of money. “You see,” the pope said, “the church can no longer say, ‘silver and gold have I none.’ Thomas replied, ‘True, holy Father, and neither can she now say, ‘Rise up and walk.’” The point here is not that mammon is an idol out in the world—everyone knows that. The point is that it is a snare within the church, and is particularly a snare for leaders within the church.

You cannot serve both God and mammon (Luke 16:13). Because of this teaching, we are told the Pharisees scorned Jesus because they were lovers of money (Luke 16:14). “For we are not, as so many, peddling the word of God; but as of sincerity, but as from God, we speak in the sight of God in Christ” (2 Corinthians 2:17, NKJV). Christian elders must not be covetous (1 Tim. 3:3; 2 Tim. 3:2). When Paul thanks the Philippians, he is careful to let them know that his desire for them is not grasping (Phil. 4:17). False teachers according to Peter are cursed children, with hearts “exercised with covetous practices” (2 Pet. 2:14). There is a certain kind of teacher who supposes that godliness is a means of financial gain (1 Tim. 6:5).

OUR RIGHT OT TALK ABOUT THIS

One of the abuses Paul had apparently been accused of by his adversaries at Corinth was the sin of fleecing the flock financially (see 12:14-18; 2:17; 7:2; 11:7-12). That is why he is at great pains to explain his financial precautions to the Corinthians. And as the great apostle has set us a good example in this, let me take this opportunity to do the same thing.

In the history of our congregation, we have never once passed the plate. The offering box is in the back, if you can find it. We present the offering during worship, but we do not gather it then. And you may have noticed that after the service the offering is counted, on the premises, by a team of men, not one man. When that offering is deposited in the bank by the church office, it is walked to the bank by a team of two staff members. The person who does our bookkeeping has no authority to cut checks. And so on. Now we do not do this because we are in a constant state of suspicion, but rather because—like Paul—we know that we live in a fallen world, and like Paul we want to do what is right in the sight of God and all men (v. 21).

A SNAKE-HANDLING CHURCH

There are two kinds of idols. One kind of idol is simply a false god, a carved piece of wood or stone that you bow down to, light candles or leave baskets of fruit in front of, and so on. This kind of idol must simply be toppled, in the most literal sense. But there is another kind of idol—where a legitimate part of your life assumes an importance it ought not to have. In this case, repentance means restoring that person or thing to their proper role. For example, Paul teaches us that covetousness is idolatry (Eph. 5:5; Col. 3:5), but after repentance, a man must still handle money. That means he must learn how.

Some misguided brethren have thought that the promise of Mark 16:18 means that handling rattlers ought to be incorporated into the liturgy. Although we do not agree with that interpretation, we are nevertheless a snake-handling church. We have an offering box in the back, and after the worship service men take it out and count it. Thus far, thanks to God, we have been spared.

THE GLORY OF CHRIST

The only way it is possible for this to happen is by the grace of God found in Christ. And when this happens, it happens in such a way as to magnify, not the church where it happens, but rather the reason it happens. Notice the phrase Paul uses to describe the team of three men who are coming to collect the offering at Corinth. What does he call them? He calls them “the glory of Christ” (v. 23). And that is what a worship service is all about, the presentation of the offering included. The whole thing is calculated to glorify Christ.

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Epiphany: Simeon (Profiles in Christmas #5)

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THE TEXT

And behold, there was a man in Jerusalem whose name was Simeon, and this man was just and devout, waiting for the Consolation of Israel, and the Holy Spirit was upon him. And it had been revealed to him by the Holy Spirit that he would not see death before he had seen the Lord’s Christ. So he came by the Spirit into the temple. And when the parents brought in the Child Jesus, to do for Him according to the custom of the law, he took Him up in his arms and blessed God and said:

“Lord, now You are letting Your servant depart in peace,
According to Your word;
For my eyes have seen Your salvation
Which You have prepared before the face of all peoples,
A light to bring revelation to the Gentiles,
And the glory of Your people Israel.”

And Joseph and His mother marveled at those things which were spoken of Him. Then Simeon blessed them, and said to Mary His mother, “Behold, this Child is destined for the fall and rising of many in Israel, and for a sign which will be spoken against (yes, a sword will pierce through your own soul also), that the thoughts of many hearts may be revealed” (Luke 2:25–35).

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