Sermon Tone Analysis

*The Last Great Commission*

*April 30, 2000               Acts 1:1-11*

 

*Introduction:*

 

Have you ever been given a task to do that you weren't sure how to do?

 

Young Man or Woman: taxes, car repair, marriage, first job, military (silent observation w~/o instruction onboard ship)

 

Child: going to school, school projects, helping father or mother

 

Mother and Father: raising a difficult child, having a difficult employment, bills

 

Older Person: know how if you can remember, or know how but can't

 

If you were successful at anything, you know that it took perseverance, observation, intelligence, time, effort, but the greatest thing you received – or could have received – was someone to show you patiently how to do it, someone to instruct you.

That didn't always happen, but it would have been nice if it did.

It is the same way in the church.

We have been given a task to do and we often seem reluctant and even refuse to do the things God prompts us to do because we don't know how or just think we can't.

We feel powerless.

Ministry: whether pastor or parishoner

 

The task we have been given is to testify about Jesus and bring believers into his kingdom.

It is a hard, even impossible task.

It is beyond us and our capability.

But Jesus commissioned us and we must believe that he wouldn't be so cruel or short-sighted as to give us something to do that was impossible.

Hard – yes – but not impossible.

How do we know that?

Because what he gave us was a co-mission.

A commission is something we have been authorized to do for another.

It is with their power and authority.

Essentially, they are with us in the task.

We are not alone because their power and authority are with us.

We can draw upon that power and authority to do what we have been given to do.

In the case of Jesus and his commission to us, that power and authority continues to instruct us in the task.

We will see in our passage this morning what he has given us to carry out the  commission he has given us.

We commonly think of this as the Great Commission that we find in Mt. 28:19-20.

But all the gospels contain some form of the great commission.

And we find it as well in the book of Acts.

/19  Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,/

/ 20  and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you.

And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age."/

/ (Matthew 28:19-20 NIVUS)/

/ /

/ He said to them, "Go into all the world and preach the good news to all creation./

/ (Mark 16:15 NIVUS)/

/ /

/46  He told them, "This is what is written: The Christ will suffer and rise from the dead on the third day, /

/47  and repentance and forgiveness of sins will be preached in his name to all nations, beginning at Jerusalem.

/

/48  You are witnesses of these things./

/ 49  I am going to send you what my Father has promised; but stay in the city until you have been clothed with power from on high."/

/ (Luke 24:46-49 NIVUS)/

/ /

/ Again Jesus said, "Peace be with you!

As the Father has sent me, I am sending you."/

/ (John 20:21 NIVUS)/

/ /

/ He commanded us to preach to the people and to testify that he is the one whom God appointed as judge of the living and the dead./

/ (Acts 10:42 NIVUS)/

 

What we have in our passage today are the last recorded words of Jesus before he was taken up to heaven, 40 days after his resurrection.

It is the Last Great Commission which we find in Acts 1:8.

It is what Jesus expects us to do before he returns.

And I'm sure the apostles felt just like you and I do when we are given a task to do that seems impossible.

We can find all kinds of excuses.

But Jesus had a plan that involves us.

*Big Question:* How do we know that we can carry out the task that Jesus gave us?

 

*Unison Scripture Reading:* Acts 1:1-11

 

Luke wrote the Gospel of Luke as well as the Book of Acts.

What do we know about him?

/"Only Luke is with me."

So wrote Paul late in life from a Roman prison, just one evidence of their close relationship.

/

/   Early tradition suggests that Luke was born a Greek in Antioch and became a physician before being converted and joining Paul, Silas, and Timothy in Troas on Paul's second missionary journey (early 50s).

Luke was later shipwrecked with Paul on Malta and jailed with Paul in Rome.

/

/   He went to Greece around the time of Paul's death and from there wrote his two-volume history of Jesus and the early church.

The second volume, The Acts of the Apostles, is mostly about Paul's missionary journeys, and in four passages, Luke includes himself in the story, using the pronoun "we" to narrate various events.

/

/   One second-century prologue to the Gospel of Luke claims: /

/   "Having neither wife nor child, [Luke] served the Lord without distraction.

He fell asleep in Boeotia, at the age of 84, full of the Holy Spirit."

/

/   Constantine the Great transported Luke's remains to Constantinople in 356, where they are said to be preserved in the Church of the Apostles.

/

/   -- "Paul and His Times," Christian History, no.

47./

 

Luke wrote not only his gospel to his patron, Theophilus (meaning friend of God), but he also wrote the Book of Acts as a supplement to him.

Luke did not leave us with just the ministry of Jesus upon the earth, but continued to write about the profound after-effects of Jesus' ministry in the formation of the early church through the apostles.

We might consider Acts just an historical account about the beginning church, and Luke did intend it to be an historically accurate account.

Like his gospel, it covers a period of 33 years.

Both were written on scrolls that were a maximum of 33 feet long.

This in itself necessitated two books.

But Acts is much more instructive and meaningful than just history.

The two main themes of Acts are witnessing and the Holy Spirit.

Both these themes are tied directly to Christ.

They are what made his promise of the church actually work.

The disciples were emboldened to witness about his truth, and the Holy Spirit that Jesus gave them worked supernatural power to achieve it.

These twin themes have much for us to learn and apply even in today's church, and indeed they are the subjects and the power behind the 32 speeches that make up 25% of the narrative in Acts.

The outline for this witness in the book of Acts follows the geographical sequence given by Jesus in Acts 1:8 (Jerusalem – ch. 1 thru 7, all Judea and Samaria – ch.

8:1 to 11:18, to the ends of the earth – ch.

11:19 to the end).

We will find many other sub-themes in Acts that will instruct us besides the Priority of Evangelism and the Power of the Holy Spirit (Acts has also been called "The Acts of the Holy Spirit").

We will see the witness of Community Life,

the value of Teaching as part of the evangelistic process,

the power and priority of Prayer (14 of the first 15 chapters mention prayer),

the Breaking of Human Barriers as the gospel spreads across them to the ends of the earth,

the Place of Suffering necessary for the church to witness,

the Sovereignty of God even through that suffering,

the Jewish Reaction of the Gospel (it was these to whom it was first given, but they rejected it, and it was then taken to the Gentiles),

and the Defense of Christianity before the state.

How do these themes instruct us in the church today?

To our society that puts a premium on individuality and privacy, we have a church in Acts that presents a radical change by holding all things in common.

To our society that even seems to admire selfishness, we have a church that presents itself so committed to Christ that they are willing to sacrifice for the good of others.

To our society that defines truth as subjective and personal, we have a church that bases its life on objective truth about Christ that is held to be universally valid for the entire world.

To our society that denies the persuasive power of absolute truth, we have a church that holds fast to the Lordship of Christ in order to convert the world.

To our society that has pressed its love for specialization upon us, we have a church filled with people who are willing to do any task for the cause of Christ.

To our society that has pressed its love of self-preservation and improvement upon us, we have a church that sacrifices the best they have in order to reach the lost.

To our society that has pressed its love of technique upon us, we have a church that depended upon the Holy Spirit and gave top priority to prayer and moral purity.