Empowered by the Holy Spirit

Acts

Christianity is the world’s largest religious group with almost 1/3 of the Earth’s population identifying as Christian. That is over two and a half BILLION people! That is a lot of people. Especially when you consider that, according to scripture, it all started with a handful of disenfranchised messianic Jews in a small upper room. According to the book of Acts, this Spirit lead movement started with a sect of Messianic Jews who were a persecuted religious minority in ancient Jerusalem.

Today we are going to take a look at where it all started. We are going to hopefully learn something about the Book of Acts and how the message within applies to us today. The question on the front of my mind is, “How does that happen?” After Jesus was crucified, all of the disciples were running scared. These guys seemed like the least likely to lead a new religious revolution. After Jesus appeared to them they got excited, but there were still so few of them.

How does God start with less than 20 people squeezed in a room, and about 120 total believers, and become the largest religious group in the world? Not only that, but He did it without YouTube, Facebook, and TikTok. Nobody was going “viral” on the internet. He took ordinary people, poor people, the outcasts, and transformed countless lives throughout history. It sounds impossible.

We’re gonna find out. The book of Acts is going to tell us how it all started. Before we dive in, let’s pray.

Pray

Does anyone know who wrote the book of Acts? Both the book of Acts and Luke’s Gospel are anonymous, however we are pretty certain that Luke wrote them. Within 100 to 150 years they were attributed to Luke. More importantly, Luke was a companion of Paul, and the author would have had to have been with Paul to write some of Acts. This book was written around the year A.D. 62.

How many of you have heard it called, “The Acts of the Apostles?” That is the traditional name of the book of Acts. The reason for this is the way the scrolls in the New Testament typically obtained names. In the early days of Christianity, someone might write a scroll and send it to your church so that you would have the account of an event or teaching. Eventually you might receive a copy of another scroll. Take the Gospels for example. Let’s say you were a part of a church that had John’s gospel. You probably just called it the Gospel. Later, someone brought you a copy of Mark’s testimony of Jesus’ life.

Now you can no longer say, “Let’s look at the Gospel.” You’re probably gonna have to pick. “Let’s look at the Gospel according to so-and-so.” The title, “The Acts of the Apostles” is a pretty traditional Greek and Roman title for an early biography. So you might see something from that time called, “The Acts of Aristotle” or something. The point is, all of these names came one or two hundred years later. When these scrolls were first written they didn’t have names. In fact, Luke opens Acts by referencing his Gospel account by saying, “In my former book...”

The point I am building up to is the fact that the book of Acts can be misleading if we think of it in terms of a title. As we are going to learn, the book of Acts is not really about the Apostles. In fact, only two Apostles even have a prominent place in the whole book. Peter is central in 9 of the 28 chapters, Paul in 16, Stephen in 2, and Philip in 1. The only true character who continues from page one to the last page of Acts is Jesus and the Spirit. So a more accurate title or approach to this book would be, “The Acts of Jesus Through the Holy Spirit.”

Luke picks up in book of Acts right where his Gospel left off. He wrote the two to be a seamless account of how Jesus turned the world upside down. In order to fully appreciate this, I encourage you to read through both Luke’s Gospel and the book of Acts together. You will find numerous parallels between the two books, as well as many connections to the Old Testament. We will talk about some of them, but there are too many connections for us to cover in the short time we have here. Plus, you should experience the excitement of finding these things on your own too.

We know that Luke wrote Acts, but who did he write to. He tells us right away in verse 1…

Acts 1:1 NIV

1 In my former book, Theophilus, I wrote about all that Jesus began to do and to teach

Theophilus (They-oh-fee-los). The interesting thing about Theophilus is that his name means, “Friend of God.”

A Concise Dictionary of the Words in the Greek Testament and The Hebrew Bible 2321. Θεόφιλος

Θεόφιλος = friend of God; Theophilus

Some people believe that Luke is not writing to an actual person, but a symbolic person. As if he is writing to people who love God in general. I think something far more important is going on here. For one thing, Luke calls him a proper name with a title, indicating that he is writing to a real person. As you read through the book of Acts you will see many miraculous things happen. In fact, according to one of my commentaries…

Life Application New Testament Commentary Introduction

Acts has it all—supernatural intervention, astounding miracles, powerful preaching, breathtaking escapes, harrowing journeys, life-and-death decisions, courtroom dramas, thrilling rescues, action, mystery, and adventure! Acts will grab your attention, trigger your imagination, and tug at your emotions. It’s a terrific story and a great read … and it’s true.

In other words, I fully believe this is yet another way God is supernaturally intervening in our lives. Did Luke know his name meant friend of God? I am sure he did, and whether he intended to or not, when he wrote this letter to Theophilus, he also wrote it to followers of Christ across the world for the rest of time. He continues…

Acts 1:1–2 NIV

1 In my former book, Theophilus, I wrote about all that Jesus began to do and to teach 2 until the day he was taken up to heaven, after giving instructions through the Holy Spirit to the apostles he had chosen.

This is interesting to me and why I think we should change the name from “The Acts of the Apostles” to “The Acts of Jesus Trough the Holy Spirit.” Notice the words Luke used at the end of verse one. He wrote about all that Jesus BEGAN to do and teach. He didn’t say that he wrote about what Jesus did. He didn’t even say that the Gospel was about the Good News of the Messiah who came and fulfilled prophecy. There is no finality to his statement. His Gospel was about what Jesus STARTED!

If his first book was about what Jesus started, then this book must be a continuation of what Jesus is doing. Before we even finish reading verse one Luke has given us the driving message of the book of Acts from God. If you are taking notes, we can say that the book of Acts teaches us this…

Key thought:

Believers are empowered by the Holy Spirit to bear witness to the Good News of Jesus Christ, who is the fulfilment of God’s promises from the beginning of time.

This is the message that Jesus preached. This is the message that Jesus commissioned the Apostles to spread. This is the message that Jesus has commissioned us to share. How did God do it! How did God take a handful of people and spread His message to billions! The simple answer is the power of the Holy Spirit. Let’s keep going and let’s see how Jesus and the Holy Spirit has and still is completely changing a lost, evil, and broken world one person at a time. As we do, let’s also pay close attention to how that might apply to us today.

For the rest of our time this morning, I want to share a few tips this passage gives us in order to let the power of the Holy Spirit work through us to change the world around us. And as we’ll see in a moment, you don’t have to get on a plane and travel to some remote village in the Amazon to do the work God has called you to. If God is going to change the world around you through the Holy Spirit, we need to let Him prepare us. I love the phrase Nate Sala uses. He calls it…

TRANSFORMATIVE PREPARATION

What is transformative preparation? According to scripture there are four ingredients: Time with God, scriptural teaching, patience, and letting the Holy Spirit work in you. Let’s see how that played out for the apostles, starting in verse three…

Acts 1:3–5 NIV

3 After his suffering, he presented himself to them and gave many convincing proofs that he was alive. He appeared to them over a period of forty days and spoke about the kingdom of God. 4 On one occasion, while he was eating with them, he gave them this command: “Do not leave Jerusalem, but wait for the gift my Father promised, which you have heard me speak about. 5 For John baptized with water, but in a few days you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit.”

This passage mirrors what Luke wrote in chapter 24 of the Gospel of Luke. In his Gospel he goes into a little more detail and says that Jesus “opened their minds so they could understand the Scriptures.” What is Jesus doing? He is spending time with them. He is teaching them. These men spent day after day with Jesus listening to His teaching, yet at this moment it was still important for them to stop what they were doing and spend intimate and intentional time with Jesus in order to be prepared for what was to come.

Luke’s use of the number 40 here is what should make us pause and do some serious thinking. You can probably think of a few stories in scripture involving the number 40. It is the number used during testing or transformative preparation. For example, the rain fell for 40 days and 40 nights, purifying and transforming the world in Genesis 7:12. In Exodus 34:28 Moses spent 40 days and 40 nights on Sinai receiving the Law from God and also being transformed to the point where his face glowed. The Israelites wandered in the wilderness for 40 years in order to prepare them to enter the Promised Land in Deuteronomy 8:2-5. In preparation to begin His ministry, Jesus spent 40 days in the wilderness being tempted by the enemy (Luke 4:2).

In this passage, Luke is showing us that the apostles are doing the same thing. They are spending 40 days with Jesus to prepare for the ministry that He has called them to. They are following the same pattern that Jesus set out. They are fulfilling the pattern that God laid out in the Old Testament when He promised to transform His people…

Ezekiel 36:26–27 NIV

26 I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. 27 And I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws.

Transformative preparation. It is very important for us to spend time with God, asking Him to teach us His ways and transform us. Then we must have patience and let His Spirit work in us until He calls us out of Jerusalem, if you will.

The next thing Jesus teaches the apostles is to…

FOCUS ON THE TASK AT HAND

Installing fireplaces, we get to meet a lot of people who are building new homes. Usually, you can tell when someone is trying to be their own contractor or if they hired a home builder. Two things normally happen with people who aren’t familiar with building homes. For one, they will call us and order their fireplace right when they need it. The other common mistake that happens is they will let their framer build a “standard fireplace opening.” When they say that, you know they don’t know what they are talking about because there isn’t a standard.

I have an idea as to why this might be happening. When we are doing something we aren’t very familiar with, sometimes we will get hyper focused on the finished product. In other words, if I am building a house I am staring at the picture I found in the magazine of how I want my house and my fireplace to look. What I am not thinking about is the first step that must happen in order to build that fireplace. I am not thinking about the specific pipe I need for the chimney. I am not thinking about the exact framing dimensions that my 36” fireplace needs. I am not thinking about how high I can build my hearth or that I might need special materials on, around, or under the fireplace.

To put it another way, instead of focusing on the task before me, I am focused on the finished project. Many people say, “Put one foot in front of the other. Focus on one step at a time.” The Israelites did the same thing in Exodus. They said, “My feet hurt! I am tired of walking! I am ready to eat real food! How much longer is it going to be?” They complained until they decided they were better off in slavery!

How could someone get to the point of thinking it would be better to be a slave than to be with God? Yet, how often do we turn back to our fleshly desires? That is slavery. Slavery to sin. How easy it is to fall back into slavery. How do we stick to this goal of letting the Holy Spirit transform us? One step at a time. Focusing on the task at hand. Don’t get overwhelmed with the big picture. Don’t get impatient because things aren’t happening as fast as you think they should. Don’t get discouraged because you feel like you are moving backwards even though you know God has a plan to move you forward.

Look at what Jesus said to the apostles when they started getting a little anxious about God restoring the kingdom to Israel. He just spent 40 days teaching them about the Kingdom of God, then told them that in a few days they would be baptized with the Holy Spirit…

Acts 1:6–8 NIV

6 Then they gathered around him and asked him, “Lord, are you at this time going to restore the kingdom to Israel?” 7 He said to them: “It is not for you to know the times or dates the Father has set by his own authority. 8 But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”

We’ll get there when we get there! Have patience, because when you receive the Holy Spirit you will have work to do. Don’t worry about how this whole thing is going to look in the end, just have patience and do the job you were given. You are going to start small. First you will witness in Jerusalem. Then, Judea and Samaria. Then to the ends of the earth. You have a lot of work to do, so focus on that.

It wasn’t because of their lack of scripture knowledge that they asked this. They just had a 40 day course on the Kingdom of God. It’s likely because of that knowledge that they were excited and anxious. Jesus responds to them by paralleling Old Testament scripture. He is helping them to understand that by doing what He has called them to do they are fulfilling the prophecy they are asking about. Just keep putting one foot in front of the other, because by doing so you are fulfilling your calling. The house won’t be built in a day.

The Holy Spirit will empower them to do the work, they just need the transformative preparation, they need to focus on the task at hand, and they need to…

TRUST IN GOD

This really goes hand in hand with the last point. It is impossible to focus on the task in front of you if you don’t trust God. We know we can trust Jesus because He is God’s Word became flesh. He has been given all authority. His kingdom is everlasting and cannot be destroyed. This would have been the one of the first things to pop into the apostles minds as they witnessed what happened next…

Acts 1:9–11 NIV

9 After he said this, he was taken up before their very eyes, and a cloud hid him from their sight. 10 They were looking intently up into the sky as he was going, when suddenly two men dressed in white stood beside them. 11 “Men of Galilee,” they said, “why do you stand here looking into the sky? This same Jesus, who has been taken from you into heaven, will come back in the same way you have seen him go into heaven.”

More parallels. Luke describes Jesus being taken into a cloud. The apostles would have been very familiar with the stories of God leading their ancestors through the wilderness by a pillar of cloud. They would have been familiar with the stories of the Glory of the Lord covering Mount Sinai in a cloud while their ancestors watched and waited for God to speak. They would have been familiar with the stories of the cloud that covered the tent of meeting as the Glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle. They were probably amazed as they stood their silently unable to move as they realized they were watching Daniel 7 play out in front of their eyes…

Daniel 7:13–14 NIV

13 “In my vision at night I looked, and there before me was one like a son of man, coming with the clouds of heaven. He approached the Ancient of Days and was led into his presence. 14 He was given authority, glory and sovereign power; all nations and peoples of every language worshiped him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion that will not pass away, and his kingdom is one that will never be destroyed.

The way Luke tells this story parallels his Gospel again. When the women found the tomb empty they were in much the same state of shock when two men in clothes that gleamed like lightning said, “Why do you look for the living among the dead? You know this, He told you He would be raised again.” These two angelic messengers said the same thing to the apostles. “Why are you staring into the sky like a doofus? You know what is happening here.”

And we know too. We know that we can trust God, we just come up with all sorts of reasons to abandon that trust. We let the enemy trick us into doubting. Like Adam and Eve, we decide that we know a better way.

Jesus wants to transform us through the Holy Spirit with His transformative preparation, by giving us a single local task to focus on, and we only need to trust Him and…

GO TO WORK

In the rest of Chapter 1, the apostles travel down from their retreat with Jesus on the Mount of Olives and they go back to Jerusalem. While they are there they patiently wait for the Holy Spirit, and they go to work doing one task at a time that needs to be done. The big thing they do is fill the empty place Judas left as one of the twelve disciples.

The book of Acts is an amazing book and I am excited to have the opportunity to study it together. I will do my best not to get too far into the weeds with it so that it doesn’t get boring, but I would definitely encourage everyone to study this one as we go. We might hit it all at once, and we might take breaks here and there, but either way I fully believe God wants to use this study to transform us. The question is whether or not we will let Him. I want to leave you with one final bit of encouragement from the Life Application Commentary…

Life Application New Testament Commentary Message

Although believers continue to be pressured to give up or give in, by faith in Jesus Christ and in the power of the Holy Spirit, the church can be a vibrant agent for change. God wants to work in you and through you. Filled with his Spirit, as a courageous witness, you also can share the Good News with the world—with your world.

Pray