To the Ends of the Earth (Acts 1:8)

Transcript

JR 52
05/10/2026
To the Ends of the Earth
Acts 1:8
Jesse Randolph


Our text for this morning is Acts 1:8, I'd invite you to turn there with me to the book of Acts and to chapter 1. As you're turning there, for those who aren't maybe as familiar with Scripture and the layout of the Scriptures, you have the layout of the first four books of the New Testament—Matthew, Mark, Luke and John—those are the Gospels, and then you'll find the book of Acts, and that's where we'll be today, in Acts 1:8. God's Word reads, “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you and you shall be My witnesses, both in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and even to the end of the earth.”

Some of you may have heard of this expression of the seven last sayings of Jesus. It's an expression which comes from the field of New Testament studies and what that phrase or expression, the seven last sayings of Jesus, refers to are the different things that Jesus said, the different cries He let out, the different assurances He gave as He hung upon the cross. The seven last sayings of Jesus include “Father forgive them for they do not know what they are doing, today you shall be with Me in paradise, woman behold your son, My God My God why have You forsaken Me, I thirst, it is finished and then last Father into Your hands I commit My spirit.” Now the reality is that while those would be the final seven sayings of Jesus on the cross, those aren't actually the final sayings of Jesus. They aren't the final red-letters, if you want to think about it that way, in the New Testament. There are other words Jesus spoke which are recorded in later New Testament writings. In Acts 20:35 Jesus is quoted as teaching that “it is more blessed to give than to receive.” Or in I Corinthians 11:24-25, a passage I'll typically read from when we do our communion service, Jesus is quoted as saying, “This is My body which is for you. Do this in remembrance of Me.” Or “This cup is the new covenant in My blood. Do this as often as you drink it in remembrance of Me.” We have our passage for this morning, Acts 1:8, which comes after some of those so-called last sayings of Jesus and here the Lord in our passage some 40 days after His resurrection to the Disciples who had gathered around Him said, “You shall be My witnesses both in Jerusalem and in all Judea and in Samaria and even to the end of the earth.”

Now, since we're dropping right into a single passage today and not only that we're dropping into a mid-sentence passage today, it’s also important that we establish some of the context. In fact, look at Acts 1:1, we'll start in the very beginning of this book since it's not too far from where we're starting. Acts 1:1, and as you're looking up the page there, I'll just remind everybody that the book of Acts is the sequel to the Gospel of Luke. The book of Acts was written by Luke sometime in the early 60s A.D., guided by the Spirit of course, and as we saw early in our sermon series in the Gospel of Luke, what we're normally in on Sunday mornings, Luke and Acts were written by one human author, Luke, Dr. Luke, and they were directed by one divine author, the Holy Spirit. The two books, Luke and Acts, really fit together like massive puzzle pieces, the two books are undoubtedly connected. The Gospel of Luke gives us this really beautiful intricate account of the life and the death and the burial and the resurrection of Jesus, and then the book of Acts, what we'll look at today, gives this account of the early history of the church which Jesus bought with His blood.

So, with that let's look at these first two verses, Acts 1:1-2. Luke through the Spirit writes, “The first account, oh Theophilus, I composed 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.” So right away we see this link between Luke and Acts. You know back in Luke's Gospel in Luke 1:3 Luke says, “It seemed fitting for me as well, having investigated everything carefully from the beginning, to write it out for you in orderly sequence, most excellent Theophilus.” Then here, verse 1 of chapter 1 of Acts, Luke says, “The first account, oh Theophilus, I composed about all that Jesus began to do and teach.” So, the mention of Theophilus in both books and that fact that in Acts 1:1 Luke refers to the first account tells us that these books, Luke and Acts, are a package deal.

Now look at verse 3 and note what it says here. We don't often catch this as we read quickly through the narrative of Acts. It says, “As Jesus was giving orders to His Apostles to whom He also presented Himself alive after His suffering by many convincing proofs,” we're told that “Jesus was appearing to them.” This is verse 3, “over 40 days and speaking about the things concerning the Kingdom of God.” So, Jesus, right there it is saying, was speaking about His future Kingdom reign by which He will come to this earth, return to this earth in conjunction with His Second Coming. I find that fascinating, that Jesus hasn't yet wrapped up His First Coming, He hasn't even yet ascended to the Father, that comes later in verse 9, but He is already speaking with His Disciples about His Second Coming. He is already talking about His future Kingdom. We should keep that in mind when we deal with folks who say that the future doesn't matter or that eschatology doesn't matter, or that all we need to know from the Bible is that Jesus died for us. I mean, yes, of course, in some sense that is absolutely true, to be saved all you need to know and believe is that Jesus died for you and rose for you. That's Romans 10:9. Salvation comes by faith alone, grace alone, through Christ alone. But we also must be mindful of what is said here in Acts 1:3 that when Jesus was speaking to His Disciples in that 40-day window after His resurrection, He was speaking with them “concerning the things of the Kingdom of God.” Not only that, but He also promised them that they would receive His Spirit, verse 4. “And gathering them together He commanded them not to leave Jerusalem but to wait for the promise of the Father, which He said, you heard of from Me. For John baptized with water but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now.” More on the Holy Spirit in just a moment but note that Jesus said what He said about being baptized with the Holy Spirit. As He says that, it is clear that His Disciples as He is mentioning the Holy Spirit coming in days to come, the Disciples still had the Kingdom on their mind. Look at verse 6, “So when they had come together, they were asking Him saying, Lord, is it at this time You are restoring the kingdom to Israel? And He said to them,” verse 7, “It is not for you to know times or seasons which the Father has set by His own authority.” Then our passage, verse 8, “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you and you shall be My witnesses both in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and even to the end of the earth.”

Now what we're going to do this morning on this Mother's Day is work our way through that single verse, this single passage, verse 8, “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and shall be My witnesses both in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and even to the end of the earth.” As we do so we are going to see that Jesus called His followers, His Disciples there in the first century before He ascended to the Father. And He calls on you and me today as we seek to follow Him faithfully with our lives, He calls us as His followers number 1, to a Spirit-empowered mission. He also calls us, His followers, to an outward-extending mission. Those are our two points this morning, if you are a notetaker. We have A Spirit-empowered Mission, and we have An Outward-extending Mission.

Let's start with that first one which is that Jesus has called His followers to A Spirit-empowered Mission. Note the first few words of verse 8 where Jesus said, “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you.” Now note the word “But” there is contrasting what Jesus said immediately prior in verse 7 where He said, “It is not for you to know times or seasons which the Father has set by His own authority.” The times and the seasons for what? Well go back to verse 6, the times and the seasons is referring to the Kingdom to be restored to Israel. Look at the Disciples' question in verse 6. “Lord, is it at this time that You are restoring the kingdom to Israel?” And then Jesus's answer, if I may paraphrase, is don't worry about that. The Kingdom is coming. But in terms of the timing of when the Kingdom would come, verse 7 again says, this is Jesus, “It is not for you to know times or seasons which the Father has set by His own authority.” Then our passage, verse 8, “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you and you shall be My witnesses. . .” In other words, you aren't to be busying yourselves or concerning yourselves with the timing of when My Kingdom will come. You are to be busying yourself, rather, with the proclamation of My message, that is, the message of the Gospel of salvation.

You know when a person is saved, and we know that they are saved from sin, but they're saved not only from sin, but they are also saved to future glory, saved for future glory, saved for Christ's coming Kingdom. In this life, and in these bodies and in this world, we are saved to be ambassadors of that coming Kingdom. As ambassadors of that Kingdom, Christ's Kingdom, His followers, Believers, they need His Spirit. Hence our first point here, that ours is A Spirit-empowered Mission. You know Jesus's original Disciples, they needed His Spirit and they received His Spirit when the Spirit descended upon them on that first day of the church, the Day of Pentecost. Look down the page at Acts 2:1, it says, “And when the Day of Pentecost had fully come, they were all together in one place. And suddenly there came from heaven, a noise like a violent rushing wind and it filled the whole house where they were sitting. And there appeared to them tongues like fire distributing themselves and they rested on each one of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak with other tongues as the Spirit was giving them utterance.” These early Disciples needed the Holy Spirit, and they received the Holy Spirit. That is what we see here in Acts 2, and that's in fulfillment of Jesus's words in our passage, Acts 1:8 where it says, “you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you.” Believers ever since from early church history up to the present have been no less in need of the Spirit of God in proclaiming their allegiance to Jesus and proclaiming the hope that is to be found in Him.

You know David Brainerd, missionary to the Native Americans of New Jersey in the 1720s was fully in need of the Spirit of God to proclaim the hope of the Gospel. William Carey the British missionary to India in the late 1700s and early 1800s was fully in need of the Spirit of God to proclaim the message of Jesus. David Livingstone, missionary to Africa, Hudson Taylor, missionary to China, Jim Elliott, missionary to the Auca Indians of Ecuador needed the Holy Spirit to proclaim the message of Jesus. We are no less in need of the Spirit of God in our day. We need the Spirit when we are sitting across the table from our unsaved uncle on Thanksgiving Day and we are thinking of words to say. We need the Spirit of God when we are with our unsaved father on his birthday or unsaved mother on Mother's Day. How are we going to broach the topic? How are we going to get into the conversation about their need for Christ?

So, brothers and sisters, let me ask you this. Are you dependent upon the Spirit as you share your hope in the Savior with others? Is your strategy for witnessing to others, sharing the hope of Christ you have with others, is it Spirit-dependent? One way to know if it's Spirit-dependent is if you are a prayerful Christian, if you pray to God for power from His Spirit to embolden you to share the hope that you have. Is your life, is your strategy for witnessing to the lost undergirded by prayer? Do you pray that the Spirit would embolden your heart and direct your steps and loosen your tongues and open your mouths as you prepare to share the hope of Christ with others? As you devote yourself to prayer, Colossians 4:2, as you are watchful in it with thanksgiving do you pray, as it says in Colossians 4:3, that “God would open up a door to you for the proclamation of the Word.”

See, the Disciples in Jesus's day, again, they were waiting for the Spirit to come. Jesus had promised them in John 14:16 that He would send them another advocate, meaning the Holy Spirit. That's why the language of our text in Acts 1:8 is still future, “You will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you.” So even this crowd here around Jesus in Acts 1, they were thinking of the Spirit in future terms. You as a follower of Christ here today, if you are a follower of Christ, if you are a child of God, if you are a slave to God's Son the Lord Jesus, you're not awaiting the Spirit to fall on you the way that these first century Disciples were. No, the Spirit of God is already in you. You have been “sealed,” Ephesians 1:13, “with the Holy Spirit of promise.” Ephesians 1:14 says that “the Spirit has been given to you as a pledge of your inheritance.” If you are a follower of Christ, Romans 8:14 says you “are being led by the Spirit of God” which in fact proves that you are a son of God. If you are a follower of Christ, Psalm 143:10 says, “God's good Spirit leads you on level ground.”

Knowing that as a Believer that God's Spirit lives in you, do you pray that God through His Spirit might open a door to the Gospel? Do you pray that the Spirit who has sealed you, Ephesians 1, would embolden you to open your mouth and share the Gospel with any unbelievers with whom you come into contact? Do you pray that God through the Spirit who is sanctifying you and progressively molding you into the image of Christ the Son that He would give you words to speak when you come into contact with that lost soul? If not, why not? These Disciples of Jesus here in Acts 1:8, they were told that the Spirit would come upon them and then empower them for the Lord's service as they served as His witnesses. In other words, they were very aware that they needed the Spirit to do the task that had been set before them. So why would it be any different for us? Why would we, maybe not with our words but with our actions indicate that we think we don't need the Spirit or that we don't need to rely upon the Spirit to proclaim the very same Gospel message that these first century Disciples were charged to proclaim?

Well after saying to His Disciples, “You will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you.” Jesus next said this, “And you shall be My witnesses both in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and even to the end of the earth.” Let's camp out on the words “you shall be My witnesses” for just a few moments here. For starters as we think about the structure of that sentence, we have to ask a primary question, is Jesus giving a command here or rather is He making a statement of fact. Is this a simple recitation of fact. And the answer is it's a command, this is a command, “You shall be my witnesses.” One of the reasons we know that comes from Acts 10. Go ahead and turn with me please to Acts 10:42, this is that scene with Peter and he is involved with Cornelius and he is doing his ministry to that man. In Acts 10:42 we have Peter here now referring back to Jesus's words in our text in Acts 1:8 saying that “He,” that's Jesus, “commanded us to preach to the people and solemnly to bear witness that this is the One who has been designated by God as judge of the living and the dead.” So, see Jesus didn't suggest that His followers become His witnesses, nor did He lightly encourage them to become His witnesses. No, according to Peter's inspired words here in Acts 10:42 Jesus had commanded His Disciples, commanded His followers to be His witnesses. He had commanded them, to use Peter's words here in Acts 10:42, to preach to the people and in doing so “to solemnly bear witness that this is the One who has been designated by God to judge the living and the dead.” Peter knew his charge, he knew that he had received marching orders, he had received a command to bear witness to Jesus Christ, to bear witness to the One who will one day judge the living and the dead; Peter got it. He knew what he had been commanded to do, he knew what Jesus meant back in our passage, Acts 1:8, right before Pentecost when he said to Peter and the other Disciples, “You shall be My witnesses.”

Now the question we all need to grapple with this morning, all this time removed from this passage and all these miles away from the setting of this passage, the question we need to grapple with is do we get it. Do we understand the charge? Do we understand the command? Do we understand what it means to be Jesus's witnesses? Do we understand what it means to be witnesses for Christ? The Greek term for witnesses here is martures and it's the word from which we get our English word martyr. The word martyr or martures means the one who testifies, he who testifies. There are all these figures from church history that we know of as martyrs, you know Justin Martyr and Polycarp of Smyrna and Ignatius of Antioch and Perpetua and Felicity, they are all called martyrs and we link their martyrdom to the fact that they died, that they shed blood for Christ. As Tertullian once said, the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church. But the fact that there are martyrs is not necessarily defined by the fact that they died but rather they did what before they died? They testified, they witnessed, they testified about Jesus Christ.

An old Dallas professor, Thomas Constable, notes that the definite work of these witnesses was to bear testimony to their master. They were not to be theologians or philosophers or leaders, but witnesses. Whatever else they might become, everything else was to be subordinate to the idea of personal testimony. It was to call attention to what they knew of Christ and to deliver His message to mankind.

Witnesses, martures, those who testify. The word is a legal term, and the word carries these connotations of being in a courtroom or in Jesus's time, first century Judea, some sort of ancient tribunal. And you can picture the scene, I'm sure. Right? This table of some sort where you have these opposing parties on either side of the table. You have a judge, an arbiter of some sort who is ultimately going to make a decision of some manner. You have an advocate; we call that the lawyer today who is making his case before the judge on behalf of the parties whom he represents. Then you have these people who testify who are called what? Witnesses. Witnesses are those people who saw what happened. Witnesses are those people who share the story. Witnesses are the people who are open about what they witnessed. You know, it was on Boaz's threshing floor that I saw Ruth lying there. It was Mahalel's goat who kicked my daughter. You know like you are witnessing to what you saw. That's what the witnesses, the followers of the Lord Jesus Christ are to be in this world. We aren't the judge and the jury, that is God. We aren't the prosecutor, that's Satan. We aren't the defense attorney; that's the Holy Spirit. We are witnesses and witnesses testify. As any witness would do on a witness stand in a tribunal or a court of law, witnesses for Jesus Christ open their mouths. They will proclaim to anyone who will listen that Jesus is the way and the truth and the life and that no one will come to the Father but through Him. They'll testify that salvation is found under no other name, that there is no other name by which men might be saved. They'll follow the charge of Paul in Colossians 1:28 saying “Him we proclaim.”

Witnesses though, they don't just rattle off Bible verses. Ultimately, they make an appeal. The way that a witness on a witness stand might point to the person at trial and say, That's the person who rode off with my bicycle or that's the woman who entered the green house. A follower of Christ does the same, they'll say, “There is the One who saved my life, there is the One who saved my soul. I testify on pain of whatever may happen to me that He is the One who is worthy, He is the One who saved me, and He is the One who gets glory. I'm here to testify that He is the One who will also save you if you put your faith in Him as I have done.”

A couple of weeks ago two men, Mark Medina and Kody Keller, stood up here in the waters of baptism and before they were immersed, before they were dunked, they did what? They testified. They testified to the power of Jesus Christ in raising them from the dead spiritually, it was even written on their shirts. Now let's say Mark or Kody had stepped into these baptismal waters with their raised to life t-shirts on and let's just say they had stepped out into the water and then just stood there awkwardly, staring at all of you for five minutes straight. Quiet, silent, like you are feeling awkward right now. Let's say that is what they have done. You know the water is sloshing around mid-waist and they are just looking at you and you are wondering, why is he staring at me, why isn't he saying something. Now let's say they just walked out the other side of the baptismal and you go greet them afterwards. What would you say to them? Would you say to them, thanks for the testimony. Would you say thanks for being such a faithful witness. No, you would be confused, you would be wondering, like why were you just standing there. What were you doing getting the lower half of your body wet and not saying anything, though you wore the T-shirt. What do those words mean, then, raised to life, if you weren't even willing to say something about you apparently being raised to life. Now if a person standing silently in the waters of Baptism would not be characterized as a faithful witness, how can somebody who stands silently in this world and doesn't speak up for Christ be called a faithful witness? They can't.

Turn with me if you would to the book of Ezekiel, Ezekiel 33. I'm going to give you some background information on this book. Ezekiel was written some 600 years before the birth of Christ, and it was addressed to Jews who were exiled to Babylon during this time. The whole purpose behind Ezekiel writing what he wrote, including what he writes here in Ezekiel 33, was to warn these Jewish exiles that the holy city of Jerusalem was about to be destroyed, that their period of exile in Babylon was soon to wind down, although overall it would be very lengthy. But even then, there was good news layered into Ezekiel's prophecy in that it foretold that there was a day coming where the Jewish exiles would return from Babylon, return to the land and it even pointed to a future Messianic Kingdom that would one day be established.

Now with that as our backdrop to Ezekiel, that's sort of the theme of Ezekiel, look at Ezekiel 33, starting in verse 1. It says, “Then the word of Yahweh came to me saying, ‘Son of man, speak to the sons of your people and say to them, if I bring your people and say to them, if I bring a sword upon the land and the people of the land take one man from among them and make them their watchman, and he sees the sword coming upon the land and blows on a trumpet and warns the people, then he who hears the sound of the trumpet and does not take warning and a sword comes and takes him away, his blood will be upon his own head. He heard the sound of the trumpet but did not take warning. His blood will be on himself. But had he taken warning, he would have escaped with his life.” So the basic idea here is that if a man were appointed a watchman, a herald, as Ezekiel the prophet had been, and if he were faithful to blow the trumpet and sound the alarm about the peril that was about to befall the people, if those who heard the sounding of the trumpet had failed to heed the warning, then what? The blood would be on their heads; the blood would be on them. Now look at verse 6, “But if the watchman sees the sword coming and does not blow the trumpet and the people are not warned and the sword comes and takes a person from them, he is taken away in his iniquity but his blood I will require from the watchman's hand.”

Now in verse 7 Yahweh starts getting more personal with Ezekiel. He says, “Now as for you, son of man, I have given you as a watchman for the house of Israel so you will hear a word from My mouth and give warning from Me. When I say to the wicked, oh wicked man you will surely die, and you do not speak to warn the wicked from his way, that wicked man shall die in his iniquity but his blood I will require from your hand.” Then verse 9, “But as for you, if you on your part warn a wicked man to turn from his way and he does not turn from his way, he will die in his iniquity, but you have delivered your life.”

Earlier this week I came across a sermon in First Baptist Church of such-and-such town and the sermon that was preached from this passage, Ezekiel 33:1-9, was titled provocatively “Bloody Hands.” I thought some of my sermon titles get a bit much but “Bloody Hands.” Well, in the sermon the preacher said to this group of Christian Believers that the purpose of Ezekiel 33:1-9 is to lay out this point, that failure to share Christ with someone is an unforgivable sin for which you will answer before the throne of God with bloody hands. Now that is not true, that is not true. A Believer's failure to witness, your failure to share the Gospel with the gal at Scooter's is not the unforgivable sin. Even if failure to share with an unbeliever were a sin, we remember the words of I John 1:7 which is that “the blood of Jesus cleanses us from all sin.” Right? Not only that, Ezekiel, the Prophet was being addressed directly by God as a prophet in Israel, a man of his time, a watchman who was in the middle of actual physical warfare which was about to be waged. So there admittedly are these points of disconnect between what the Prophet Ezekiel received here in Ezekiel 33 and our charge to be witnesses for Christ in the current Church Age. But even then, and this is why I turned us here, there are some key principles to extract from Ezekiel 33, even if this passage isn't directly addressed to the Church Age or the church here in Lincoln in 2026. The principles that migrate over from Ezekiel 33 include some of these: that there are people around us who are in danger and God has commanded us to warn those people of the danger that awaits them. If we fail to warn those around us who are in danger it will not only be to their peril, but it will be to our shame. Ezekiel was a watchman, followers of Christ today as we've seen in our passage, Acts 1:8, are to be witnesses. But the charge is essentially the same, to warn this generation as Ezekiel did in his day, to flee from the wrath to come.

So I put the question again before you, as members of this flock, as those who would say you put your faith in Jesus Christ, are you a faithful witness to Jesus, the very Jesus who we learn in I Thessalonians 1:10 will “deliver those who believe in Him from the wrath to come.” Or instead, are you a silent witness, as though there could be such a thing. It's actually a contradiction in terms, it's like the silent baptismal candidate, a silent watchman, to use Ezekiel's terminology, as you sit idly by while those who march right past you are marching steadily not only unto death but into the pit of hell. What a sad thought that is, that the unbeliever's path to hell, though he certainly deserves it as we all ultimately do, that the unbeliever's path to hell is going to be flanked on either side by this long line of individuals who say they love the Lord and who say they love the lost but evidently not enough to open their mouths. We're called, church, to be witnesses.

Back to our passage, Acts 1:8, “you shall be My witnesses.” Again, that's a command, it's not you could be My witnesses, or won't you please be My witnesses, or you should be My witnesses. It's you shall be My witnesses. That is the command that Jesus gave to His Disciples as He charged them to carry out their Spirit-empowered mission. That was our first point, A Spirit-empowered Mission.

As we move on we're now going to see that Jesus gave His Disciples some parameters about the reach and the scope of that Spirit-empowered mission in the second half of verse 8, Acts 1:8. He says, “You shall be My witnesses both in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and even to the end of the earth.” Our second point, again if you are taking notes, is that we have An Outward-extending Mission. The title of our sermon this morning is “To the Ends of the Earth,” and the title comes from our Lord's words here to His Disciples in the original context and by extension to us that “you shall be My witnesses both in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and even to the end of the earth.” Jesus's Disciples were to go forth with that message, that message being that He, Jesus, as God who had come in the flesh in His incarnation, He came to die for the penalty of the sins of the world, to pay the penalty for the sins of the world. But He didn't lay idle in the tomb. No, He rose, He was resurrected on the third day. He came out of the grave victorious and now He calls on the entire world to repent of their sins and to believe upon His death and resurrection and have forgiveness granted and the hope of eternal life given. Jesus's Disciples are called to go forth with that message, the message of the Gospel, the message of the good news that “God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him will not perish but have everlasting life.” That's the message that was given to the original Disciples of Jesus and to go proclaim as witnesses in their day, and that's the message that we are called to proclaim in ours. The message hasn't changed; it's the everlasting Gospel.

Now note the spheres into which Jesus commanded His Disciples to take that message. He said, “You shall be My witnesses both in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and even to the end of the earth.” Let's start with Jerusalem. As they proclaimed the message of hope and forgiveness and life that is found through Christ, Jesus's Disciples were to start where it all began, in Jerusalem, in the holy city, the city in which Jesus ministered at length, the city over which Jesus lamented in Matthew 23:37 where He says, “Jerusalem, Jerusalem who kills prophets and stones those who are sent to her.” That's the very city, of course, in which our Lord was crucified. It was there in Jerusalem, the home base, that Jesus's Disciples would first issue their call to repent and believe in the Gospel. It was there in Jerusalem as we learn later in Acts 2 that some 3,000 souls were converted on the day of Pentecost. Eventually a number of those early followers of Christ fanned out from Jerusalem and then proclaimed the message of the Gthrough Judea. Judea was a district which encased or enclosed Jerusalem along with other cities, the way that we think of states and cities. Nebraska encased Lincoln and Judea encased Jerusalem.

Turn with me if you would over to Acts 8 where we see how the Gospel advanced in the very way that Christ said it would go. Acts 8:1, here what we have after describing a “great persecution,” it says, “which began against the church in Jerusalem.” This would be after the stoning of Stephen in Acts 7. We're told here by Luke that they “were all scattered throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria except the apostles.” So, the Apostles stayed in Jerusalem and then just as Jesus had predicted and commanded would happen back in Acts 1:8, this broader group of followers, Disciples, fanned out more widely across Judea and then we also know across the neighboring district of Samaria. Samaria was even further from the home base of Jerusalem than Judea was, and Samaria was this place that was full of people known as half-breeds. It was a derisive term which was taken from the fact that many of the people there had as their ancestor’s people who had intermingled, interbred with their Assyrian conquerors hundreds and hundreds of years prior. Well to the people of Jerusalem, the region of Samaria was known as this compromised, distant, polluted land, the way that we would think about Iowa. That would be Samaria.

Now, you know sometimes I'm like, I go too far with the Iowa stuff, I have a kid going to Iowa State next year, so I have to be very careful. But here I think it actually fits really well, the Iowa/Nebraska thing. If Jerusalem were like Lincoln and Judea would be like the state of Nebraska, Samaria would be like crossing the border, going over the Kerry Bridge into that polluted, compromised land known as Iowa. Right? The half-breeds, the heathens. I'll stop there. Well, it was to that land, Samaria, that the Gospel went forth in those early days of the church. While you're in Acts, look at Acts 8:4-5. It says, “Therefore those who had been scattered went about proclaiming the good news of the Word. Now Philip,” it says, “went down to the city of Samaria and began preaching Christ to them.” Now that's a remarkable statement there, to take the Gospel at this time to this despised people group, the half-breeds as the Jews knew them at this time, this group that people went out of their way to avoid. This was a big deal, Philip going down to Samaria was uncharacteristic for a Jew at this point. But he was ultimately honoring the Lord's words back in Acts 1:8 where the Gospel would go from Jerusalem to Judea and then to Samaria. He was heeding the Lord's words and heeding the Spirit's direction and the Lord blessed it. In fact, if you look at Acts 9:31, look at what it says here. Acts 9:31 says, “So the church throughout all Judea and Galilee and Samaria was having peace, being built up. And going on in the fear of the Lord and the encouragement of the Holy Spirit it continued to multiply.”

So, in the days of the Apostles, the Apostolic Era that we've seen so far, the Gospel went out to Jerusalem, it went out to Judea, it went beyond that to Samaria and then ultimately in the Apostles' day the Gospel went to the end of the earth, at least as they conceived of it. It went to places like Scythia, that's a northern region, modern day Ukraine or thereabouts. Scythians are mentioned as recipients of the Gospel in Colossians 3:11. We know the Gospel went south to Ethiopia, down the African continent. We think of Philip's interaction with the Ethiopian eunuch in Acts 8. We know that the Gospel went to Rome, to the westernmost part of the then known world because we know that Paul brought the Gospel to Rome. We know that he was imprisoned in Rome. It was from Rome that he wrote four of his epistles—Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians and Philemon. In fact, at the end of one of those letters, in Philippians 4:22 Paul writes, “All the saints greet you, especially those of Caesar's household.” What that tells us is that by the early 60s A.D. not only Paul but the Gospel which Paul had been charged to proclaim had made its way all the way to Rome, to the thought-of end of the earth.

Getting back to our text in Acts 1:8, you can turn back to Acts 1:8, Jesus was commanding His original Disciples, those in His presence, to be “witnesses both in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and even to the end of the earth.” What we've just flown through is that a mere few decades later His Disciples had taken the Gospel to those very places. Now last week one of our elders here, Steve Snyder, came up here and he announced that we as an elder team have developed a philosophy of missions. And like Aaron mentioned you can find that at ihcc.org/missions, and we've put together that philosophy of missions because we believe we do have a mandate from God from His Word to bring the Gospel of Jesus Christ first to the city of Lincoln and then outward to the state of Nebraska and then outward from there through the missionary partnerships that we've established to the ends of the earth. That mandate stems from the text that we've been working in this morning, Acts 1:8, where Jesus Himself says in red letters, “You shall be My witnesses in Jerusalem and in Judea and Samaria and to the ends of the earth.”

I'll get into that more in a minute, but a few more insights and observations about this text. For starters we've already seen this morning that Jesus delivered these words here to a group of first century Disciples. And in doing so He was charging those He was looking at where He could see the whites of their eyeballs right there in front of Him, He was charging them to go to actual geographic destinations to take the Gospel. We just looked at the fact that the Disciples did so. The book of Acts is all about the Gospel going from those places and fanning outward after Jesus ascended to the Father. But there are again implications and applications flowing out of this text, including the fact that the Lord calls all His followers of all generations to take His saving Gospel to the ends of the earth. Christ's followers, whether they are living in the 1st century or the 21st century, are called to take His Gospel to the most outlying, distant parts of this globe. They are called to take the Gospel to those who are near and they are called to take the Gospel to the furthest corners and outposts of the world. One of our elders this morning in our prayer time said it this way, we are called to take the Gospel from Havelock to Honduras. I think he said that really well. Remember the words of our Lord in the Great Commission, Matthew 28:19-20. He says, “Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to keep all that I commanded you.” Or think of a couple of passages that we've worked through in recent Sunday evenings in the book of Revelation. Revelation 5:8 is the heavenly throne room scene that the Apostle John saw in his vision and he sees this. He says, “When He had taken the scroll,” that's referring to the ascended, glorified Jesus, “the four living creatures and the twenty-four elders fell down before the Lamb, each one having a harp and golden bowls full of incense which are the prayers of the saints. And they sang a new song saying, Worthy are You to take the scroll and to open its seals because You were slain and purchased for God with Your blood people from every tribe and tongue and people and nation. You made them to be a kingdom and priests to our God, and they will reign upon the earth.” Or there is this language from Revelation 7:9, John says, “After these things I looked and behold a great multitude which no one could count, from every nation and all tribes and peoples and tongues standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes and palm branches were in their hands. And they cry out with a loud voice saying, Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne and to the Lamb.”

What each of those Revelation passages is teaching us is that there is a future day coming when God's people will be gathered around this throne. And around this throne every tongue and nation and tribe and people will be represented. What that tells us is that every tongue and tribe and nation and people will eventually be reached with the Gospel of Jesus Christ, but first the Gospel needs to go out to every tongue and tribe and people and nation. That means that the Gospel needs to be preached to every tongue and tribe and people and nation. As it is stated in Romans 10:14, “How then will they call on Him in whom they have not believed? How will they believe in Him whom they have not heard? And how will they hear without a preacher? And how will they preach unless they are sent?” Who is going to send them?

Well, that takes us back to our church and our new philosophy for missions. We believe that we have a part to play in coming alongside those who are already committed to bringing the Gospel to lost people all over this sin-cursed planet. That is all tied into the passage we've looked in this morning, Acts 1:8, which we believe serves as our charter to take the Gospel across the globe. “You shall be My witnesses both in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and even to the end of the earth.”

Now I imagine there are some here this morning, a few of you who are scratching your heads, and you are wondering about this new direction and our church getting involved in overseas missions and you are thinking to yourself, we haven't done missions at Indian Hills for a long time and I would say you are right. It's true that we have not done missions at Indian Hills for a long time, but it's also true that the current team of elders has decided to change course. We are all very excited and encouraged and looking forward to what the Lord will do through us and through our church as we support Gospel work in other places through trustworthy, vetted, aligned individuals and organizations like Myron Drent and Middle East Ministries.

Now others of you might be thinking wait a minute, isn't our mission field Lincoln? Aren't there souls to win here? Aren't there empty seats in this auditorium? Yeah, of course. Absolutely. Our mission field is Lincoln, Nebraska. We do need to bloom where we are planted, we do need to share the Gospel with the lost right here. But it does not logically follow that by prioritizing Lincoln, Nebraska as we've always had as our mission field that we also can't commit resources. That whether by way of encouragement or prayer or even financial resources toward individuals and groups who are doctrinally aligned and philosophically aligned and who are already doing an excellent job at taking the actual Gospel, the Biblical Gospel to places it has yet to go. Priority does not mean exclusivity, local church priority which we would all affirm does not mean that we can't get involved as a church in the advance of the Gospel overseas; especially when we have texts of Scripture like the one we just looked at which are saying that we need to take it to the end of the earth. “You shall be My witnesses both in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and even to the end of the earth.”

In the days of the Disciples in the first century, what we've looked at this morning is that their witness started in Jerusalem. Today, for us, it starts here in Lincoln. In the days of the Disciples that witness fanned out into Judea and Samaria. For us as a church that witness goes out across Nebraska whether it be through Bott Radio or Sound Words or our ministry partnerships that we already have of IFCA or you name it. In the days of the Disciples their witness eventually expanded beyond Judea, beyond Samaria and it went out to the end of the earth, as they conceived the end of the earth. Today for us as a church the Gospel will go to Uganda through men like Myron Drent, to Israel through groups like Middle East Ministries and to the ends of the earth. Again, as elders of the church we believe we not only can partner but we ought to and we should partner with like-minded individuals and organizations who are working diligently to bring the Gospel to the end of the earth. And not only that, but we are also confident that we can do so in such a way that neither minimizes nor dismisses local church Lincoln, Nebraska priority.

As we say in our philosophy for missions, at IHCC the goal is to see God's glory declared among all peoples and all nations. That starts with reaching those who are near, here, and then taking it across the globe, taking it across the world to those who are far away. It is really important to frame it in that order. First near, then far. First local, and then global. What we don't want to have happen, and we're committed to not having this happen, is a reversal of priorities here at the church. You know John Stott was right when he said that we have a global God and so we are to serve globally as Christians or go out globally as Christians. But we have to remember that we are constantly reminded in the New Testament that as Believers we are called to be attached to a local church, we're called to place ourselves in a local church, we're called to give to a local church and submit to elders in a local church and exercise our gifts in a local church. Then ultimately be sent out from a local church as witnesses for Christ.

I bring up those really basic reminders here about the global versus the local because I want to lay down an important caution that I want you all to heed as we think about this new missions direction. I fear there might be some who would take this new Missions Philosophy and they'll use it as an excuse, a crutch really, to not serve as witnesses for Christ here in Lincoln on the home base. I mean, I can just about guarantee that there will be some here who are feeling prompted to give to missions, to give to Uganda, to give to Israel, but at the same time they will not lift a finger, evangelistically speaking, in terms of getting the Gospel out here at home. They'll be gung-ho about making Disciples of all the nations and fulfilling the Great Commission in Matthew 18:19-20 but they'll conveniently forget that nations are already here in the city of Lincoln, Nebraska. Right? I mean, there are historically a heavy German population here, there is a heavy Russian population here, there is a Czech population here. That is the nations. Then you run it forward into the more current generations and there are the Vietnamese here and Chinese here and the Indian here and the Burmese here and the Sudanese here. The nations are here.

So, question. Who among us is walking the streets of the Sudanese neighborhoods to declare the Gospel of grace? Who else is traveling North 27th to the different ethnic restaurants, delicious food by the way, and proclaiming the Gospel to those from the nations who are already here? You know if you heard what you heard last Sunday from Steve or you are hearing what I'm saying here today and you're going to start writing checks to Myron Drent or MEM but you won't go out with the Monday Night Invites crew on Monday nights or you won't even talk to your server at lunch today about the Gospel, then you are missing the point. You have it backwards; you have this sermon wrong and you have this text wrong. It all starts here. Outreach starts here. Evangelism starts here through your local church and in your local community. If you are thinking, this is convicting and I'm really not evangelistically engaged, get engaged. Do it here. Start here. Start local. Get equipped. Get trained. Talk to John Carey, talk to the E-team about ways you can get involved in missions right here in Lincoln. And then think of ways to get more involved in missions in more outward ways. Don't get too gung-ho about going global if you're not willing to walk out your front door and talk to your neighbor.

As I wind down here, I'll say it again, in case there is any nervousness about the direction we are going. Our priority as a church is here, our priority as a church is Lincoln, Nebraska. Lincoln, Nebraska will always be our main focus, our top priority, but again priority does not necessitate exclusivity. We are called to be Christ's witnesses both in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria; Lincoln, Nebraska, Iowa, even to the end of the earth.

Father, thanks so much for a chance this morning to work through a simple text, one that I know we are familiar with, one we've read before and one that convicts and one that we need to grow through. God, I praise You for the faithful witness that this church has been, a beacon of light and truth going back many, many decades. I praise You for the impact it continues to have here in our community and even fanning outward beyond us. God, I pray that You would help us as a church to remain faithfully committed, devotedly committed to sharing the Gospel in this region, in this city, in this state. God, I pray that if there are those who are being faithful and simply want to expand upon their faithfulness and support the work of the Gospel in other places that you would lay that on their hearts as well. God, what we praise You for this morning is that You are a God of grace, a God who saves, a God who forgives and Your work on earth here is not done. You have more people to save, more nations to reach, more people groups to get the Gospel to and we simply want to be faithful in stewarding the treasure of that Gospel hope. God, we ask that You would go before us, help us to be faithful ambassadors, faithful witnesses for Your name's sake. In Jesus name, amen,