Introduction & Background

Transcript

GR 1575
09/19/10
Introduction and Background (Acts)
Acts 1:1-3
Gil Rugh

We're going to begin a study of the book of Acts together so I direct your attention to that book, entitled in our Bibles, the Acts of the Apostles.  Each book in our Bibles makes a contribution to God's revelation of Himself, His person, His work, His will.  And together the Scriptures are complete, from Genesis to Revelation in conveying to us the truth that God intends us to know, believe and understand.  And all this truth together and all the individual portions of this truth contribute to our growth and development.  There is nothing extraneous, there is nothing unimportant here.  That's why Paul wrote to Timothy in his last letter, II Timothy 3, and said, “All scripture is God-breathed and profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, instruction in righteousness, in order that the man of God may be complete, perfect, [all that God intends him to be], equipped for every good work.”  So in one sense it's hard to say this portion of Scripture is important, this other portion is less important.  And yet in His revelation God has given different portions of the scripture for its own unique purpose.  And certain portions contribute to our overall understanding in a greater way.  For example the book of Genesis lays the foundation of beginnings, the beginning of creation in the opening chapters.  Without Genesis we would not have a clear understanding of how God created all things and how He uniquely created man as male and female, and so on.  And how the nation Israel came into existence and the unique way God worked with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and the twelve patriarchs in founding the nation.  So the book of Genesis has a unique contribution to make in that area of understanding.  The book of Revelation at the end of our Bibles has a similar kind of unique role in bringing together God's prophetic plan in an orderly fashion to give us a more clear understanding of how it all fits together in God's working in preparing the way for the establishing of the kingdom of His Son.

And the book of Acts plays that kind of unique role.  It's a history book, it's not a doctrinal book like the book of Romans or some of the other epistles of Paul.  What the book of Acts is doing is unfolding the history and without the book of Acts we would be left with some serious gaps in our understanding of what God is doing.  Some of the things we find out, there is a list of seven on my list, that come to light more clearly in the book of Acts.  And the knowledge of the book of Acts helps us have greater understanding.  For example, 1. How did the church begin?  We have letters written to different churches but for an understanding of how the church began we need the book of Acts for that clarity.  Secondly, how did the church spread throughout the known world?  Again, we have letters to churches in different places but how did the church spread out to those places?  It's the book of Acts that records that for us.  What were the obstacles and challenges faced in the growth of the church?  We could pick up some of these matters from the various epistles, but for a clearer unfolding of the way God worked and the obstacles and challenges that were faced by those who were used of God to move the church out from Palestine to the regions beyond and ultimately throughout the world.  It's the book of Acts that clarifies that for us.  Who were the individuals used in the expansion of the church?  That comes out in the book of Acts.  How did Paul come to be an apostle?  We have the great letters of the Apostle Paul but he wasn't one of the original apostles.  If we didn't have the book of Acts we would have Paul coming on the scene, his impact on the churches and establishing churches, the letters he wrote, but we wouldn't understand how God graciously saved him and the way He used him in the spread of the Gospel.  How did Paul come to have such a key role in the early history of the church?  We move to the last part of the book of Acts and the other apostles fade into the background and Paul becomes the dominant figure.  How did he come to play such an important role in the church?  And of course that's the background for setting the historical context for the New Testament epistles.  They were written in a historical context, that historical context to a large extent is set in the book of Acts, so that we can have a greater appreciation and understanding of what is taking place.

The book of Acts, I think, is very foundational to the church today in understanding and appreciating how Jesus Christ is carrying out the work that He promised to do in Matthew 16 when He said, “I will build My church.”  And we see how that work of building the church and establishing it throughout the world carried out in the book of Acts.  And my understanding is it is the same plan today, 2000 years later.  Much of the confusion in churches today is the result of not looking to the Scripture, looking to the book of Acts, and seeing the beautiful simplicity of the plan and program of God in carrying out the work that Christ died and rose again from the dead to do, to build His church.  All the plans, programs, ideas... I get sick of getting material that here is a new program, here is a new plan, here is a new conference.  This is going to enable your church to have dynamic growth, this is....    I mean, as though God's word was not sufficient.

James Boice, who was pastor of Tenth Presbyterian Church in Philadelphia where Donald Grey Barnhouse pastored for many years, Boice not too long ago went home to be with the Lord, but he wrote in his commentary on the book of Acts, “When I first began to study and preach on Acts I was struck by a number of things.  One was the rapid amazing growth of the early church.  Humanly speaking it had nothing going for it.  It had no money, no proven leaders, no technological tools for propagating the Gospel, and it faced enormous obstacles.  It was utterly new, it taught truths that were incredible to the unregenerate world.  It was subject to the most intense hatreds and persecutions.  Yet as Luke records its growth in this document, [the book of Acts], it spread from Jerusalem, which was in an obscure corner of the world to Rome, the world's capital, all within the lifetime of the first generation of believers.  The second thing that struck me was the concern Luke had for the actual presentation of the Gospel, that is for the early Christian preaching.  His book is only 28 chapters long, but in those 28 chapters he has included 19 sermons or formal addresses.  In other words the book is full of teaching.  What this means is that the way the Gospel spread in the first Christian century, and needs to be spread again in our time, is by the faithful preaching and teaching of the great truths of the Bible.  There is nothing today's church needs so much as to rediscover the doctrine, spirit and commitments of the early Christian community.”

I think that expresses it very clearly.  The book of Acts is a history of the first thirty years of the church and what remarkable things happen.  I'm not talking about even particularly spectacular events, certain of the miracles that happened, but just the spread of the Gospel and it could have such impact on the world in such a short time—thirty years.  That's less than the time I've been pastor of this church and they had carried the Gospel and impacted the world.  That ragtag group of individuals, who following the crucifixion of Christ were huddled out of fear in a room, awaiting their possible arrest and execution.  And we come into the book of Acts and a remarkable transformation occurs and these men become the core of a group of believers who will carry the Gospel to the world.  And 2000 years later here we are as a result of the work of God in establishing His church.

A commentary written at the end of the 19th century, 1895, said this, “The church of Christ, the records of these acts of the Holy Ghost, have never reached completeness.  This is the one book, [talking about Acts], which has no proper close because it waits for new chapters to be added so fast and so far as the people of God shall reinstate the blessed Spirit in His holy seat of control.”  And at that point we have the first thirty years of the church's history, but it is ongoing down to our day.  How did we get to be here?  Well the message of the Gospel of Jesus Christ was passed on to us and we were privileged to believe it by the grace of God and the work of the Holy Spirit of God.  And so a church is raised up and other churches and so in a very real way the history of the church continues on down to our day.  The inspired writing of the book of Acts for our Scripture has been completed, but the history of the church is ongoing.  And so the work of Christ, the work of the Spirit, in building the church continues on.

I think the book of Acts is an exciting book because we see in the history of the church the simplicity of it.  Preach Christ, preach Christ, give out the Word.  And the Spirit of God does remarkable things.

The book of Acts is a long book—28 chapters.  It is condensed, you have thirty years of the church's history packed in here.  The Spirit of God has directed highlights, if you will, to give us an overview, but everything we need to know.  You break down the book of Acts a couple of ways.  One, you can divide it around the major personalities—Peter and Paul.  So for the first twelve chapters Peter is the dominant figure; then from chapters 13-28 Paul is the dominant figure.  So a simple way of dividing the book of Acts is around the two dominant personalities, two men that are given the prominent positions.  First Peter, then Paul.  Another common way to divide the book of Acts is according to the geographical spread of the Gospel.  Down in verse 8, “You will receive power when the Holy Spirit is come upon you; and you shall be My witnesses, both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and even to the most remote parts of the earth.”  So for the first seven chapters the focus will be on Jerusalem; then through persecution the followers of Christ are spread out and the Gospel is carried to Judea and Samaria, that would be chapters 8-12; then chapters 13-28, the remotest part of the earth.  We've gone beyond Jerusalem and the regions of Palestine.  And the Gospel will be carried primarily through the missionary journeys of the Apostle Paul to the remotest parts of the earth.

We'll pick up with these opening verses and get a little more background for the book by what the writer of the book, Luke, has to say.  He says, “The first account I composed, Theophilus, about all that Jesus began to do and teach, until the day when He was taken up to heaven, after He had by the Holy Spirit given orders to the apostles whom He had chosen.  To these He also presented Himself alive after His suffering, by many convincing proofs, appearing to them over a period of forty days and speaking of the things concerning the kingdom of God.”  By all agreement, and I don't think there is any disagreement, that Luke is the author of the book of Acts, the same one who wrote the Gospel of Luke.  And he writes it to the same individual.  When he says “the first account I composed Theophilus,” the first account is the Gospel of Luke.

Turn back to Luke 1.  The recognition of Luke as the author both of the gospel and of Acts goes back very early, goes back to 150 A.D. and Luke is identified as the author of the book of Acts along with this gospel.  Even though his name is not attached it is recognized commonly.  Luke 1 begins, “Inasmuch as many have undertaken to compile an account of the things accomplished among us, just as they were handed down to us by those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and servants of the word.”  Now note here, Luke was not part of the original group of followers of Christ.  He was not one of the eyewitnesses like Peter, James, John, the other apostles.  He says these things “were handed down to us by those who were eyewitnesses and servants of the word.”  But in light of that “it seems fitting for me as well, having investigated everything carefully from the beginning, to write it out for you in consecutive order, most excellent Theophilus.”  So the original apostles had passed on information. They would write about it— Matthew, Mark, John were all eyewitnesses and were used of the Spirit to write of this.  But Luke says that he was moved to set things down, gathering all the information he could “in consecutive order.”  And again he addresses this to the “most excellent Theophilus.”  We don't know anymore about Theophilus.  It is remarkable, two of the largest books in our Bible addressed to a man we don't know anything about.  His name means beloved of God—the first part of it you can see God there and in the second part the word for love—he’s the one beloved of God.  He is called “most excellent” Theophilus.  Often a title used for someone of position.  But we don't know anything about him.  Probably a Gentile, as most believe Luke is.

Luke's intention is to write in consecutive order, pull these things together because you can understand a lot of what was being passed on, just comes, they didn't have it all gathered together yet like we have our Bibles.  Luke says the Spirit of God moved him to gather all the information he could and then organize it, put it down in an order so that Theophilus could understand it and have a clearer picture of the work of Christ.

“It seemed fitting to me having investigated everything carefully from the beginning, [verse 3 says], to write it out in consecutive order.”  Verse 4 “so that you may know the exact truth about the things you have been taught.”  So this is for the growth and development of Theophilus.  You have been taught things but I want to put them in order for you.  Like we said, we could have pieces if we only had certain parts of our Bible, but by the grace of God He has moved certain individuals to bring an order to some of these.  Like in the book of Acts we're not trying to piece together a history just from Paul's letters, which would leave us with gaps, unsure of what fits and how things fit. The book of Acts will put it in an organized way.  So that's what Luke is doing in his gospel, and the book of Acts is, if you will, the second volume.  He's going to continue on his history and follow the same kind of plan.  Put it down in consecutive order.

Now when you come to the book of Acts, Luke would have gathered information, I take it, from a variety of sources including the apostles.  He also had the opportunity in Acts to become a participant in Paul's ministry.  And through that would have given him contact with others of course.  But he could have observed Paul's ministry and also had the conversations with Paul about things when he wasn't present.

When we go through the book of Acts there are three specific portions of the book of Acts where Luke moves from writing as an observer or as a third person writing about what they did, to what “we” did.  We call those the “we” portions of the book of Acts which indicate that Luke was there on these occasions.

Turn to Acts 16.  As you can see we are well into the book.  Look at verse 10, “When he had seen the vision [this is Paul, the vision that he had with the man from Macedonia coming over and the Gospel will be carried to Greece, and so verse 10 says], and when he, Paul, had seen the vision, immediately [note this] we sought to go into Macedonia.”  Up to this point he hasn't written including himself.  We know somewhere in here Luke joined Paul and becomes part of the traveling party with Paul.  “We sought to go into Macedonia, concluding that God had called us to preach the gospel...  [verse 11], so putting out to the sea from Troas we ran a straight course...” and so on.  So here in this section, down through verse 17 for sure, the “we” continues.

Over in chapter 20 verse 5, “But these had gone on ahead and were waiting for us at Troas.”  Verse 6, “We sailed from Philippi after the days of Unleavened Bread...on the first day of the week when we were gathered together...”  And we come down really through chapter 21 verse 18, “The following day Paul went with us to James, and all the elders were present.”  So you have these clear portions in the book of Acts where Luke indicates he is part of the group traveling with Paul.  So he would not only have had opportunity to observe on these occasions, but he would have had opportunity to gather information from Paul and others who perhaps had been with Paul when Luke wasn't.  And he could have began to put things together in an orderly fashion, like he said was his intention when he wrote Luke.

Acts 27:1 “it was decided that we would sail for Italy.”  So we pick up a “we” section here.  As we go through the book you'll see, we'll talk more about the preceding context.  But this picks up another “we” section and really that will run down into chapter 28 verse 16:  ‘When we entered Rome, Paul was allowed to stay by himself...” and so on.  But you see there we, “when we entered Rome.”  So the last portion, there a long portion, Luke refers to “us” and “we” in the traveling.

He was a traveling companion of Paul.  He is mentioned three other times in that kind of context.  Look over in Colossians.  And this is a helpful reference to us because it tells us that he is a physician.  And Luke's writing indicates a well educated man, with the quality of his grammar and so on.  Colossians 4:14, “Luke the beloved physician, sends you his greetings, and also Demas.”  So here a simple way and we know at the end of the book of Acts, picking up with chapter 27 verse 1, Paul goes to Rome and then he will write his Prison Epistles.  Luke is with him.  And so he says here, “Luke the beloved physician sends you his greetings.”  And this is why we often refer to Luke as the beloved physician, it comes from this verse. It is such a brief statement about a man who is used to write between a quarter and a third of our New Testament.  The book of Luke and the book of Acts comprise between one-quarter and one-third of our whole New Testament.  To be a penman for the Word of God to that extent.

He is a physician.  How gracious God was to Paul with his afflictions and troubles.  You read II Corinthians 11, here is a man who needed an attending physician.  Here he has his own traveling physician, a godly man who is a companion of Paul.  And he sends his greetings along with Demas.  Philemon had also been written about the same time.  Philemon 24, there Luke is mentioned along with Demas again.

Look in II Timothy, Paul's last letter before his execution.  II Timothy 4:11, and Paul is anticipating his impending execution as you are aware, when he writes this second letter to Timothy.  He says, “Only Luke is with me.”  So the others for one reason and another have gone on to other places.  Sadly, verse 10 tells us, “Demas, having loved this present world, has deserted me and gone to Thessalonica.”  Tragic statement about Demas, he didn't make it.  He is with Paul in his earlier imprisonment, he joined in the greetings Paul sends from Luke and Demas.  But it got to be too much over the long haul and Paul puts it bluntly, “he loved this present age.”  The sacrifice got to be too much, he abandoned me.  But Luke is still here.  He had given up his career, I guess, as a physician to be roaming the world, at least part of the time, with Paul and probably other times being an emissary with the Gospel in other places.  We don't know.  But he gave up nothing, here we still know Luke today so used of God to write the book of Acts and the gospel that bears his names.

Come back to Acts 1.  “The first account I composed, Theophilus, about all that Jesus began to do and teach.”  The implication is the book of Acts is the continuation of the account.  “I wrote my first account to you about what Jesus began to do and teach.”  And that will take us up to the resurrection and ascension.  But now we're going to continue the account.  The work of Christ goes on, even though He is no longer on the earth.  And it goes on in His body, the church.  “About all that Jesus began to do and teach.”

Verse 2, “until the day when He was taken up, [we have inserted here “to heaven,” which is what he is referring to when he says He was taken up; he'll talk about that even later in this first chapter] after He had by the Holy Spirit given orders to the apostles whom He had chosen.”

You have to come back to Luke and the last chapter.  And I would encourage you sometime through the week to take time to read at least the last chapter of the book of Luke and to read through it and then come to the first chapter of the book of Acts and you'll see how he picks up right where he leaves off in the gospel of Luke.  Luke 24 starts out with “...the first day of the week, at dawn, they came to the tomb.”  So we are here with the resurrection of Christ.  Then some of the appearances that took place with His followers.  We want to come down toward the end of the book— instructions He had given them.  Verse 48 “You are witnesses of these things.  Behold, I am sending forth the promise of My Father upon you; you are to stay in the city until you are clothed with power on high. And Luke will pick up at this point, verse 50, “He led them out as far as Bethany, He lifted up His hands and blessed them.  While He was blessing them He parted from them and was carried into heaven.”  So you have a summary here with a few statements.

Now the book of Acts will pick up at this point with Jesus meeting with His disciples.  And then giving them instructions to remain at Jerusalem.  What He says in verse 49 here, “ ‘...stay in the city until you are clothed with power on high.’ “We see that basic statement repeated by Luke in Acts 1 because he picks up here at the end of his account and connects it again.  And then you have the ascension in verse 51, “He parted from them and was carried up into heaven.”  You'll get a fuller explanation of the ascension with the details of  Acts 1.  But you can see Luke is saying as Acts 1 began, I told you what He began to do, let's continue the account from when He ascended.  So Acts 1 will talk about the ascension and other details.  Then the promise of the Spirit comes in Acts 2 and we're ready for the continuing work of Christ through the Spirit on the earth and the church that He is establishing.

Come back to Acts 1:2, “until the day He was taken up to heaven, after He had by the Holy Spirit given orders to the apostles whom He had chosen.”  Come back to Luke 24:45, “Then He opened their minds to understand the scriptures, and He said to them, ‘Thus it is written that the Christ would suffer and rise again from the dead the third day, and that repentance for forgiveness of sins would be proclaimed in His name to all the nations, beginning from Jerusalem.  You are witnesses of these things.’ ”  That's His instruction, the Great Commission of Matthew 28, that they are to carry the Gospel to all people, what we know as the Great Commission.  The same point that he ends in Luke.

That's what he'll pick up in Acts 1, come back to Acts 1.  He tells them in verse 8, “ ‘You will receive power when the Holy Spirit is come upon you; and you shall be My witnesses.’ ”  So the power to carry out what we call the Great Commission, the instruction and commands given to them just prior to His ascension to heaven.  In Acts 1, “...given orders to the apostles whom He had chosen.”  And He's referring to what we call The Twelve, it's the eleven here.  Later in Acts 1 Judas will be replaced by Matthias.  Luke had written about the selection of the twelve, their choosing by Christ back in Luke 6:13, “and when day came, He called His disciples to Hem and chose twelve of them, whom He named as apostles.” Then the twelve were named.  So when he says in Acts 1:2, He gave “orders to the apostles whom He had chosen,” Luke had written about that in Luke 6:13 ff.  He selected out from among His many disciples twelve whom He called apostles.  They all have a special unique role as we are familiar with.

Back in Acts 1:3, “To these He also presented Himself alive after His suffering.”  His suffering refers to events of the crucifixion and subsequent resurrection.  “He presented Himself alive after His suffering.”  All that He went through in connection with the crucifixion, then His crucifixion, His burial.  “He presented Himself alive.”  He's focusing particularly on these apostles.  There are some others that the scripture records that He appeared to, like the women at the tomb and so on.  But the particular concern here is to the apostles because of the unique and special role they play in the ongoing work of Christ in building His church as recorded in the book of Acts.

“To these, [to the apostles] He also presented Himself alive after His suffering, by many convincing proofs, appearing to them over a period of forty days.”  This is the only time in the Bible we are told the time lapse from His resurrection to His ascension.  It is forty days.  And during that forty days He appeared to them on numerous occasions.  He wasn't constantly with them, He wasn't living with them, but He was appearing to them over this period of forty days.  I've noted here at least five specific occasions where He appeared to one or more of the apostles, a number of times to a group of them.  He appeared to Peter in Jerusalem in Luke 24:34, to ten apostles in Luke 24:36-43, to eleven disciples in John 20:24-29, to seven disciples in John 21, to eleven disciples in Galilee in Matthew 28.  So there over this time and what He was doing was speaking of the things concerning the kingdom of God.

Back up to Luke 24:44, “He said to them, ‘These are my words which I spoke to you while I was with you, that all things which were written about Me in the law of Moses and the prophets and the psalms must be fulfilled.’  Then He opened their minds to understand the scripture.”  So explaining how His death and resurrection relates to His being the Messiah, the King of the Jews, because they were in confusion.  They thought that He came to establish a kingdom and rule and reign and He had been crucified.  He was crucified and raised from the dead and so we're going to find in Acts 1, the disciples even on the brink of His ascension to heaven, their question is, “ ‘is it now time for establishing the kingdom?’ ”  Are you now going to establish Israel's kingdom on earth?  They had no idea that another at least 2000 years will go by, approximately to where we are today.  We still don't have the kingdom established on the earth.   He says, “‘You don't need to know about those times.’ ”  We'll see that as we move further into Acts 1.    “But you will receive power” for the ministry I have for you when the Holy Spirit comes upon you.  And that is the work that continues down to our day; the kingdom is yet future for us.

Turn over to Acts 10.  Peter is witnessing at the house of Cornelius.  The Gospel for the first time is carried to the Gentiles.  And he's telling about Jesus' life and then His subsequent crucifixion.  Acts 10:39, “ ‘We are witnesses of all the things He both did in the land of the Jews and in Jerusalem.  They also put Him to death by hanging Him on a cross.  God raised Him up on the third day and granted that He become visible, [note this], not to all the people, but to witnesses who were chosen beforehand..., to us who ate and drank with Him’ ” before His crucifixion.  Particularly the apostles are the focal point.  “ ‘He ordered us to preach to the people, to solemnly testify that He's the judge of the living and the dead’ ” and so on.  So during this 40-day period He is appearing to them, He's talking to them about the kingdom, clarifying things.

Come back to Luke 24:25.  He has appeared here to two of His followers on the Emmaus Road and verse 16 tells us “their eyes were prevented from recognizing Him.”  Then you come down to verse 25, they are talking about their confusion, that they thought He was going to establish the kingdom, basically, and now He has been crucified and it's the third day and now we've heard from certain women that His tomb is empty and they say an angel appeared to them and told them He has been raised.  And He said to them, verse 25,  “ ‘O foolish men and slow of heart to believe in all the prophets have spoken!  Was it not necessary for the Christ to suffer these things and to enter into His glory?’ ”  Then He began to explain to them what the scripture said about Him and how this all fits.  Then down in verse 31, “their eyes were opened and they recognized Him; and He vanished from their sight.”  It's the unfolding of the plan.

Peter will write that the prophets in the Old Testament wrote about the sufferings of the Messiah and the glorious reign of the Messiah, but it never was clear to them.  They never could understand how He could suffer and die, and how He could rule and reign in glory.  They wrote about it, but it was a mystery that they could not resolve.  But now it is being explained, and that's what Christ is doing during these forty days, explaining particularly to the apostles, showing His followers that suffering and death were necessary before the glory, because how is redemption going to be accomplished so that there can be a kingdom populated by a redeemed people?  The Messiah must first die and then He will come in glory to establish His kingdom.  We see it now with the completed revelation of God and we say, it's clear.  What is prophesied there, I can't understand why they didn't see it.  Try to show that to a Jewish unbeliever today.

I worked for a Jewish boss for a number of years and we had numerous conversations about the Old Testament scriptures.  He just couldn't see it.  Their Messiah was not going to be crucified, their Messiah would not suffer and die.  What about Isaiah 53, Mitch?  It says here....  I don't know.  Well, he's confused as Paul will write to the Corinthians, they have a veil over their eyes.  The veil is lifted in Christ.  So here we are ready for Luke to unfold the ongoing, continuing ministry.  Luke in his gospel records what “Jesus began to do and teach”; the book of Acts records what Jesus continued to do and teach.  The transition point in the gospel of Luke, He's doing it in an earthly ministry; in the book of Acts, He is doing it from heaven through His Spirit working in the lives of His followers, in giving forth the Word of God.

The book of Acts will be that unfolding truth.  We are the continuing account of the work of Christ today.

Let's pray together.  Thank you, Lord, for how You graciously set Luke apart for such a great work, the recording of Your revelation of the work of Your Son during His earthly life and ministry, and then the ongoing work of Your Son with a finished redemption through your Holy Spirit who would gather together the church and establish churches throughout the world and the ongoing work of Your Son in building His church.  We are amazed, Father, 2000 years later we are one of those churches established by your grace to be a testimony for Jesus Christ.  And may our study of this precious book be an encouragement and a challenge to us as we are servants to One who is Lord of the church and continues His work in and through us.  We praise you in His name, amen.