1:1 In the first book, O Theophilus, I have dealt with all that Jesus began to do and teach, 2 until the day when he was taken up, after he had given commands through the Holy Spirit to the apostles whom he had chosen. 3 He presented himself alive to them after his suffering by many proofs, appearing to them during forty days and speaking about the kingdom of God.
4 And while staying1 with them he ordered them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the promise of the Father, which, he said, “you heard from me;5 for John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with2 the Holy Spirit not many days from now.”
The Ascension
6 So when they had come together, they asked him, “Lord, will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?” 7 He said to them, “It is not for you to know times or seasons that the Father has fixed by his own authority.8 But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.”9 And when he had said these things, as they were looking on, he was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight. 10 And while they were gazing into heaven as he went, behold, two men stood by them in white robes, 11 and said, “Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into heaven? This Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven.”
1:1 In the first book, O Theophilus, I have dealt with all that Jesus began to do and teach, 2 until the day when he was taken up, after he had given commands through the Holy Spirit to the apostles whom he had chosen. 3 He presented himself alive to them after his suffering by many proofs, appearing to them during forty days and speaking about the kingdom of God.
4 And while staying1 with them he ordered them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the promise of the Father, which, he said, “you heard from me;5 for John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with2 the Holy Spirit not many days from now.”
The Ascension
6 So when they had come together, they asked him, “Lord, will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?” 7 He said to them, “It is not for you to know times or seasons that the Father has fixed by his own authority.8 But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.”9 And when he had said these things, as they were looking on, he was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight. 10 And while they were gazing into heaven as he went, behold, two men stood by them in white robes, 11 and said, “Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into heaven? This Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven.”
Redeemer exists to celebrate and declare the gospel of God as we grow in knowing and following Jesus Christ.
Joel Brooks:
If you have a Bible, I invite you to turn to Acts, the book of Acts, chapter 1. For the next 20 to 30 weeks, somewhere in between there, we're gonna be looking at the book of Acts. We're not gonna so much be going through verse by verse, but section by section. There's long narratives in acts, and so it lends itself to that. So the next 20 to 30 weeks.
Joel Brooks:
And I couldn't think of a more appropriate introduction to acts than actually watching that video on Not Forgotten, because really, that's a that's a great window or picture into what acts is about. Not forgotten, for those of you who don't know, it was started by a couple at our church. Actually, while they were still at Sanford as students and just going and visiting Peru and then listening to the Holy Spirit and deciding to go back and then to go back and then to keep going back and then finally start investing money and things like that and all of the buildings that you saw there, all of the teachers and all of that has been built from the ground up, simply by somebody just going and saying, Lord, what next? What next? What would you like to breathe life into through your spirit?
Joel Brooks:
And then you see that entire ministry coming to fruition and the Kingdom of God advancing. So I'm excited about the next 20 to 30 weeks, going through the book of Acts with you. Alright, we're gonna read the first 11 verses. We're gonna spend the first two weeks just looking at these 11 verses. In the first book, O Theophilus, I have dealt with all that Jesus began to do and teach until the day when He was taken up after He had given commands through the Holy Spirit to the apostles whom He had chosen.
Joel Brooks:
He presented Himself alive to them after His suffering by many proofs, appearing to them during 40 days, and speaking about the kingdom of God. And while staying with them, he ordered them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the promise of the Father, which he said, you heard from me, for John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now. So when they had come together, they asked him, Lord, will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel? He said to them, it is not for you to know times or seasons that the Father has fixed by his own authority, but you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you. And you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea, and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.
Joel Brooks:
And when he had said these things, as they were looking on, he was lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight. And while they were gazing into heaven as he went, behold, 2 men stood by them in white robes and said, and men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into heaven? This Jesus who was taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven. This is the word of the Lord. Thanks to God.
Joel Brooks:
You would pray with me. Father God, we pray that you would send your spirit, and that he would open up dull minds and hardened hearts to receive the word You would have for us, that we would come to such a greater understanding of Your purpose for the church and our calling as Christians, that we might see Jesus for who He really is as the supreme Lord of Lord and King of Kings. So, Father, open our eyes. I pray that my words would fall to the ground and blow away and not be remembered anymore. But Lord, may your words remain, and may they change us.
Joel Brooks:
And we pray this in the strong name of Jesus. Amen. So last week was Easter, and we got to talk about the resurrection. In particular, we got to talk about the power of the resurrection. That's why Paul, when he talked about the resurrection, he said that I might know Jesus and the power of His resurrection.
Joel Brooks:
Not that he might know Jesus and the proofs of His resurrection, or that he might know Jesus and the intellectual arguments or understanding for His resurrection, but that he would actually know that that when Jesus rose from the dead, he unleashed into this world his resurrection power. And how else would you explain the rise of Christianity apart from that resurrection power? Christianity began with just 12 ordinary men. Really, 11, when you count Judas having left. So 11 ordinary Jewish men living in an oppressed state.
Joel Brooks:
They would go on to change the world. These men were uneducated. They they didn't go to Harvard or Yale. They didn't even go to their community college. They were just very simple men.
Joel Brooks:
They didn't have any wealth or have any status. The term Christian was first used as a derogatory term. Used to look down on their cultural status and for their beliefs. That they had no political power. They didn't even have a right to vote.
Joel Brooks:
And yet, Christianity grew from this small group of people to within by the end of 3rd century, having overtaken most of Rome. I mean, it's astounding. The Roman government is the one who crucified Jesus, the founder of the faith, and yet within such a short time, Christianity had spread all over the empire. How do you explain that apart from the power of the resurrection? Now you're gonna find, if if you look out there, you'll find many documents that talk about the rise of Christianity within the Roman Empire, but there's only one book that actually goes into the details as to how Christianity changed the empire, and how Christianity rose up, ultimately, to change the world.
Joel Brooks:
And that's the book of Acts. It's one of the reasons I'm so excited about studying this. We we get to rediscover, if you will, how God changed the world through such ordinary people. Now for some of you, just hearing that we are about to study the book of Acts, it it stirs up certain emotions in you. Some of you have actually been excited all week.
Joel Brooks:
You have been thinking, finally, Acts. I brought my holy oil with me. I mean, it's time to, you know, get our holy Spirit on, and and you are just ready to speak in tongues, prophesy, do whatever you want to do. And and there's others of you who, if you're to be honest, are a little apprehensive and a little uneasy when looking at the book of Acts, because you're scared God might ask you to do something you're really uncomfortable with. Perhaps stand up, speak in tongues, in front of everybody, or maybe sell all that you have and go to some third world country, because the person next to you got up and prophesied over you that you were supposed to do that.
Joel Brooks:
I mean, your imagination's going wild when you're thinking, what is the Holy Spirit gonna ask me to do in Acts? And honestly, that's good for us to have all of those emotions stirring within us. I would call that call that a holy anticipation. I encourage you, for those of you who already brought your holy oil, bring it back next week in anticipation. Bring all of your apprehensions, all of your hopes, bring all of those things together, and we're gonna lay it before the Lord and just ask, Lord, teach us.
Joel Brooks:
What would you have for us in this book? These emotions are a good thing. Well, let's jump in. Let's begin with verse 1, in which we read these words, in this first book, O Theophilus, I've dealt with all that Jesus began to do and to teach. This book is written by Luke the physician, Doctor Luke, if you will, And it's a continuation of his gospel, the gospel of Luke, in which he had also written to a man named Theophilus.
Joel Brooks:
Theophilus was an important, likely educated non Jew. He was a Gentile, who was at least very curious about the Christian faith, if he wasn't already a convert to it. And so, he has commissioned Luke to write an orderly detailed account of the life of Jesus, and what Jesus has done. And the reason this is important for us to know this, is because we're a lot like Theophilus. This book was written to someone like us, and someone who is non Jewish, educated, somewhat removed from the culture and from the events when they happened.
Joel Brooks:
And so, we are the perfect audience for the book of Acts. It was written to people like us. And notice that Luke, he begins this account of the extraordinary acts of the apostles by saying, the word began. He uses the word began. He says, I have dealt with all that Jesus began to do and to teach.
Joel Brooks:
This word, began, is one of, if not the most important word you need to understand when grappling through the meaning of acts in our mission as a church. Although Luke has already written about the life, and the death and the resurrection of Jesus, his account of Jesus' life is not finished, because that was only the beginning of Jesus' work. Jesus is still working. Although on the cross, Jesus cried out, it is finished, or it is accomplished, His work, however, isn't finished or accomplished. Yes, forgiveness is finished.
Joel Brooks:
His atoning work is finished. His suffering is finished. But Jesus is just getting started. So Luke begins this by describing, he said, my old account, I described you all that Jesus began to do, but make no mistake, He is still finishing. There will never be a completed biography on Jesus.
Joel Brooks:
Never. Because he currently lives, and he will reign forevermore. The Bible is not about the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus, period. It's about the life, death, resurrection, ascension, and eternal reign of Jesus forever, and ever, and ever, and the story goes on. All that Jesus began to do.
Joel Brooks:
Until the day when He was taken up, and He had given commands through the Holy Spirit to the apostles, whom He had chosen, He presented Himself alive to them after suffering by many proofs, appearing to them during 40 days, and speaking about the kingdom of God. Luke tells us that Jesus stuck around after His resurrection for 40 days, and He gave proofs that He indeed was flesh and blood, fully alive. So for 40 days, He went around and He let people touch Him. He let people hug Him. Mary hugged Him so hard, finally He had to push Mary away and say, enough.
Joel Brooks:
He would eat with the disciples. He would let them see and to touch his scars. It was undeniable proof that Jesus was alive, because he knew people in the 1st century, they they would have just as much of a problem in believing in the resurrection as people in the 21st century. People in the 1st century knew that dead people don't come back to life. So Jesus, in His graciousness, He would give them indisputable proof.
Joel Brooks:
He didn't want 2000 years later for us to think of Jesus like we might of an Elvis or a Bigfoot, you know? Forever examining some kind of blurry photo. You know, is that Jesus at the McDonald's in Kansas, you know? And we're trying to wonder, is this really the risen Lord? He didn't do that.
Joel Brooks:
He appeared to 100. I love the account we have later in Acts, where Paul is on trial, and he's before King Agrippa, and he's before the governor Festus, and he is talking about the resurrection, and they think he's mad, of course. And then, Paul, at one point, he looks at Festus, and he goes, Festus, do you know what I'm talking about? Because this didn't happen in a corner. I love that.
Joel Brooks:
Festus these spaces and you might mock me, but you can't deny it happened because it wasn't done out of sight. Everybody was talking about it in your province. We saw him. The witness. There are so many witnesses.
Joel Brooks:
And so Jesus, he walks around for 40 days, and he gives indisputable proof to his resurrection. And, after he does this, he then ascends to Heaven, where He sits on His throne. Now, when we talk about the ascension, or we use the word, ascension, don't think that we're meaning that Jesus is just rising up in the air, you know, until where He disappears. That's not what we mean by ascension. What we mean is He ascended to His throne.
Joel Brooks:
That's that's how we use the term. The ascension of Jesus is when He ascends to His throne. This is when he is crowned King of Kings and Lord of Lords. Later, Paul will talk about this in in terms of this is when he was exalted. This is the exaltation of Jesus.
Joel Brooks:
This is what he was longing for his entire earthly life when he's praying in John 17 that he might return to his status of glory. He's he's praying that once again, he might be on his throne. Crown king of kings and lord of lords. This is what Paul talks about in Ephesians 1, when he says, that the Father has seated Jesus at His right hand in the heavenly places. Far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and above every name that is named in this age and in the age to come.
Joel Brooks:
It's also what Paul means in Philippians chapter 2 when he says, therefore, God has highly exalted Jesus, and bestowed on Him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus, every knee should bow, in heaven, and on earth, and under the earth, and every tongue should confess his lordship. Jesus is Lord. That's what we mean when we say Jesus ascended. Now, I've preached on the Ascension several times at the church. First off, because I think you can't understand who we are as a church and our mission apart from the Ascension.
Joel Brooks:
And second, it just lights a fire in my bones when I begin thinking about the Ascension of Jesus. I mean, can you imagine that moment at the Ascension? Can you imagine when Jesus was seated at the throne, if myriads of angels in heaven rejoice over just one sinner who repents? Can you imagine the celebration when the one who conquered sin and death came home? Can you imagine it?
Joel Brooks:
Can you imagine the procession as Jesus comes home, and as the heavenly gates are opened up, and the the flags of the city are unfurled, and all of the hosts of heaven come out to greet Him. And so you have all of the angels that were told to hold back and to not help Him at the crucifixion, who were forbidden to help Him from preventing any suffering, who could not prevent any hammer blow coming down to Him, and the guard were told to keep silent, offering no words of encouragement. Now finally, the Father says, you don't have to be quiet anymore. Unleash your praise on the one who is worthy, the conquering hero coming home. And this is where we get Psalm 24, that coronation Psalm of of be lift up your heads, oh gates, and be lifted up, oh ancient doors, that the King of glory may come in.
Joel Brooks:
Who is this King of glory? He's the Lord, mighty in battle. Lift up your heads and be lifted up, oh ancient doors, that the king of glory may come in. Who is this king of glory? He's the Lord of hosts.
Joel Brooks:
He is the king of glory. And, you're echoing that back and forth as Jesus, the conquering hero, comes to sit down on his throne. That's what we mean by ascension. The ascension doesn't get the attention it deserves. It's probably important for us to actually ponder as to why.
Joel Brooks:
Why doesn't the ascension get the attention it deserves? I mean, during Christmas season, for 1, Christmas has a season, you can't go a night during December without being invited to a Christmas party. We celebrate Christmas all month long. And then when it comes to Easter, we certainly at least celebrate Easter all day. But then, Ascension comes, there's no honey ham.
Joel Brooks:
You know, there's no family gathering, there's no exchanging of presents. The Ascension comes and it goes, and we don't even know it. Why is that? And outside of the church, outside of the church, have you noticed that there is just a mass commercialization of Christmas? I mean, Christmas drives our entire economy, and there's a little bit of a commercialization of Easter.
Joel Brooks:
You know, you have to get your new Easter suit. You have to get that pretty new Easter dress, but there's absolutely nothing when it comes to the Ascension. I mean, can you imagine an Ascension Day mattress sale? Can you like even Is there even a place for that in your thinking? There there's no place for for even the world to even anchor on and to use that, yet we can have Memorial Day sales.
Joel Brooks:
We'll commercialize anything, but there's something about the Ascension. It's hands off. Why is that? Why is it? I think the world can get behind Christmas because of some of the generic themes.
Joel Brooks:
Peace, love, goodwill, sweet little baby Jesus. I mean, just, I mean, we have little baby Jesuses all over our house during the Christmas season. We love, we love the little baby Jesus. The world does. And that's a Jesus, to be honest, I think the reason the world loves it is because that Jesus is no threat.
Joel Brooks:
That's a Jesus that you could control, a Jesus that's harmless. You might even use the word, that's a Jesus that's fragile. But what about the ascended Jesus? Well, that's a fully mature Jesus, one who has conquered the grave, destroyed sin and death. Now, he is seated on the throne.
Joel Brooks:
Well, that's a different Jesus altogether. You can't dare commercialize that. You actually have to believe that or reject that. The question is, church, do you believe it? Do you hold to the ascension of Jesus?
Joel Brooks:
That Jesus right now is on His throne, currently ruling the world. He is, And that is both the present reality, and it's our future hope that Jesus reigns. I want you to notice something, that after the resurrection, Jesus didn't come around giving high fives. You know, alright, Peter did it, you know, Andrew did it. He's not he's not going around celebrating and giving high fives as if his work is done.
Joel Brooks:
Finally did it. He's not giving high fives, He's giving commands. That's what Jesus does after He rises from the dead. He gives commands through the Holy Spirit. And then he says, you will receive power when the holy spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses.
Joel Brooks:
Jesus says, you will do these things. He's not asking. He's commissioning. He is the risen King, being exalted on his throne, and now he is giving instructions to his followers to start building his kingdom, to start kicking down the gates of Hades, to start going on the offensive. That's our mission, church.
Joel Brooks:
I have found that most Christians really don't know what to do with the Ascension, but we know what to do with the cross. If there's a criticism I have with the Reformed Evangelical Church, is that it has little room for the ascension ascension, but it absolutely hovers and has everything to do with the cross of Christ. We love the cross. We preach the cross. We study the cross.
Joel Brooks:
We sing about the cross. We love it because it's at the cross that Jesus paid for our sins. It's at the cross that we find forgiveness. We find our atonement. It's at the cross that we see the love of God so gloriously displayed for us, so we should celebrate and love the cross.
Joel Brooks:
We should sing about the cross. We just did when we sang Jesus paid it all. But it doesn't stop there. We must not stop there. If we only focus on the cross of Christ, there is actually a danger for us of creating some form of self absorbed Christianity, A Christianity in which we only focus on our personal deliverance, our own forgiveness, our own sanctification, our own salvation.
Joel Brooks:
And we we begin to think that we were saved just to be saved, and it's all about us. But salvation is not an end in itself. Just as in acts, we read that Jesus, he died and he rose again, and this is all that Jesus began to do. The death of Christ, when supplied to us, we are then forgiven, and now it's just what we are beginning to do. But now we have our marching orders.
Joel Brooks:
Now that we have been forgiven, now that we have been cleansed, now it is time for us to get to work. And this is where Easter and the Ascension come in, because we realize Jesus didn't just save us, but he saved us for something. Jesus is risen from the dead. He broke the stranglehold of sin and death, and now, he is seated at the right hand of God as King of Kings and Lord of Lords, and now he has given us a mission that we are to declare his lordship to the ends of the earth. Jesus saved us, not just to save us.
Joel Brooks:
He saved us to be heralds of the gospel, to be witnesses of his redeeming work, to testify to his lordship. We've been given the glorious task of now going into the world and telling people who Jesus is. In the last words of Jesus before he ascended, we we read here, he says that we are to receive the power of the Holy Spirit in order to be witnesses in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and to the ends of the earth. In Matthew's gospel, we read that when He was ascending, He said, go therefore and make disciples of all nations. Baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you, and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.
Joel Brooks:
If you were to combine both of those statements together, you get the mission of the church, and it's this. You are to be filled with the Spirit of God, that you might have power to go and to be my witnesses. To go and to make disciples in your home, in your neighborhood, in your city, and all the way to the ends of the earth. And rest assured, as you do that, I am with you. I'm with you always until I come.
Joel Brooks:
That's our mission, and it shapes everything that we do as a church. I've gotta be honest with you, when I look around at churches, I don't see churches on a mission. I mostly see churches as a bunch of people gathered together who are just bored. They're just bored. I mean, they might have a lot of activities.
Joel Brooks:
They might have a lot of programs. You know, they might do all the typical things that, you know, some churches do, but they're they're bored, and there's no way around it, because they they don't grasp the ascended Jesus in their calling as a church. And bored churches do the exact same things that bored people do. Bored people do one of 3 things, or they do all 3 of these things. The first thing a bored person does is that they go shopping.
Joel Brooks:
Bored people go shopping, or they find a hobby, or they just start eating. That's what I do when I'm bored. I just open up the fridge. I mean, how many times have you opened up the fridge and you don't even know why you have it opened? It's not like you're hungry, you're just bored.
Joel Brooks:
So people either churches either go shopping, they find a hobby, or they begin to eat. They do those things because churches are filled with people, and that's what people do when they are bored. So when churches are bored, they go shopping. They buy things they don't need. Buy things with no kingdom purpose whatsoever, just because they can.
Joel Brooks:
Perhaps, get larger facilities, fancier buildings, every bell and whistle possible, just because they can, and what else are they going to do? Or, a church can find a hobby, and by hobby, I mean they're gonna they're gonna do whatever they can to try to entertain themselves. Try to come up with some more entertaining programs, or some edgier music, or pick some flash in the pan idea that's come across the church that'll spark your interest for maybe a month or 2 before you get bored again. Or, you go the eating route. And by that, I mean, you just start racking up study, after study, after study, after study, always consuming.
Joel Brooks:
Meanwhile, the rest of the world starves, because he won't leave the safety of this church building. But the cure for boredom is not shopping. It's not exciting programs. There are more studies. It's for the church to actually understand its mission and to embrace it.
Joel Brooks:
It's to understand the commission, the commissioning that Jesus has given us, that He has ascended and He is currently reigning as king, and He has given us His marching orders. After the resurrection, Peter, he was wondering what to do with his life. He went back to fishing. He went back to his old life. Perhaps, it was what he felt comfortable doing, is just going fishing.
Joel Brooks:
And if you remember from the gospel of John, we have that account of the resurrected Lord going to Peter after He's returned back to fishing. And I love John's account. So Jesus, he goes to the shore and he calls out to Peter, who's been fishing and not catching anything, and Jesus says, hey, why don't you cast your nets out on the right side? And Peter does, and he gets this massive haul of fish. And this had happened to Peter before, so he knows it's the Lord, and so they bring in this massive haul of fish, but then John adds this great detail in this account.
Joel Brooks:
He says that they brought the fish aboard, or on the shore, and there were a 153 fish. He actually tells us the number of the amount of fish there were, which means that Peter brought the fish ashore, he laid them out, and he counted every one of them. There's a 153 fish. It's a catch of a lifetime. And it's at this moment that Jesus says, Peter, can you bring some of the fish here?
Joel Brooks:
And they eat and have breakfast, and Jesus looks at Peter, and He says, Peter, do you love Me more than these? Now, most people think that Jesus is talking about the disciples. Jesus, do you love me more than the disciples? But I don't think that's what Jesus is referring to there. I think there's a reason that John tells that Peter brought these fish aboard, laid them out, and he counted all of them.
Joel Brooks:
153. I think Jesus is looking at those and saying, Peter, do you love me more than these? Do you love me more than your old life? The best your old life can ever get. Do you love me more than your old life after the catch of a lifetime?
Joel Brooks:
Is that what you wanna go back to fishing, or do you want to be a fisher of men? Do you want to feed my sheep? Do you want to be the rock on which I build my church? Or do you want your old life? And that's a question that comes to every one of us, is is what do we want if you had the option of going back to your old life with everything you can imagine as best as it could possibly be?
Joel Brooks:
Is that what you would want? Or do you wanna follow Jesus as Lord with reckless abandonment and be fishers of men? Jesus' last command needs to be our first concern as a church, It needs to be the words that we live by. They are marching orders, church. He's given us a new way of living, that we would go, and that we would tell, and we would be heralds of His lordship.
Joel Brooks:
Jesus didn't save you just to save you. He saved you to send you on a mission. If you would, pray with me. Lord Jesus, we don't want a 153 fish. We don't want that life as appealing as it might look.
Joel Brooks:
We want to bend our knee and submit to your lordship. We wanna be part, part of what you're doing in this world as you are making all things new. So Lord, give us the strength to obey you and to be heralds of your lordship to the ends of the earth. We pray this in the name of Jesus. Amen.