Gtcotr/ws042419
We
just came through the most holy week of the year. Late last week we remembered
the sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the anniversary of His crucifixion. This past
Sunday, just three days ago, we celebrated the resurrection of our Lord and
Savior.
Jesus
was born of the Virgin Mary in the town of Bethlehem just as the prophets
proclaimed. He was the Son of God and the Son of Man and well aware of His
purpose. Jesus plainly told everyone why He had come:
Luke 4 NKJV
18 “The Spirit of the LORD is
upon Me, Because He has anointed Me To preach the gospel to the poor; He
has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted, To proclaim liberty to the
captives And recovery of sight to the blind, To set at liberty those who
are oppressed;
19 To proclaim the acceptable
year of the LORD.”
This
message, first spoken from heaven through the prophet Isaiah, was misunderstood
for centuries. Jews and those who followed the prophecies of the servants of
Jehovah, believed the Messiah would come to establish His Kingdom on the earth
in a tangible way. They were looking for a strong militaristic leader who would
gather an army of zealots and fight against the tyranny and injustice of wicked
and evil men.
It
wasn’t until after the resurrection of Jesus that His close followers began to
understand that the prophecies concerning Messiah were first and foremost aimed
at eternity. The beliefs they held, although true, were to be fulfilled in a
different way than most expected. Every promise of God was complete in Christ
at the resurrection. The eternal Kingdom of God did not come with observation
but yet was secure and resident in all who believed in and called upon the name
of Jesus as Lord.
Jesus
secured eternity first and then turned His attention on those things which
would offer men and women, boys and girls, the opportunity to enter into this
eternal Kingdom. Those who would be saved by His grace through their faith
while on the earth would ultimately be swallowed up by life at the moment of
the death of their mortal body. For the Born-Again Believer, spiritual death
would never be known.
Jesus
came to earth with two primary goals. First:
1.
To
destroy sin and its power over the souls of mankind.
a. He had to do this as
a man – and then …
2.
To
establish His Church in the earth.
a. This was to be
accomplished by His followers as He directed them from His throne in heaven
through the power and presence of the Holy Spirit.
b. The Church was the
hope that others might learn of Him.
The
scriptures cast many reflections on the Church. The Church is referred to as:
·
The
Body of Christ
·
The
Bride of Christ
·
The
Family of God both in heaven and earth
·
The
Army of the Lord
·
A
Royal Priesthood
·
A
Holy Nation
·
The
City of the Great King
·
The
Generation of Jesus Christ
·
The
called out, called together sons and daughters of God
·
The
Holy Habitation of God throughout eternity
From
the cross of Calvary Jesus paid the debt for all sin forever. In the grave He
buried our sins and defeated the devil, taking the keys of death and hell from
him. In the resurrection Jesus gave His followers victory over death and the
grave and secured His Lordship throughout eternity.
After
the resurrection, Jesus remained on the earth for 40 additional days to help
with the next step in His plan. Jesus had a goal of building the Church and He
invested His time in a few people to get it going. Earlier He gave His
disciples a glimpse of the work He was preparing them to do.
Matthew 16
18 “And I also say to you
that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build My church, and the gates of Hades
shall not prevail against it.
19 “And I will give you the
keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth will be bound in
heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.”
When
on the cross Jesus said, “It is finished.” He was talking about the first step
of His plan. Sin was defeated in human flesh. A man, Jesus, in His humanity,
defeated sin in His flesh. He won that victory. The next part of His plan was
to defeat the devil and then defeat death and the grave. He did that during the
three days in the bowels of the earth and finally sealed this victory at His
resurrection.
This
brought Jesus to His next step: the building of His Church in a way so that the
gates of hell could not prevail against it. I believe this was one of the main
reasons Jesus stayed on the earth for 40 days after His resurrection.
1 Corinthians 15 NKJV
3 For I delivered to you
first of all that which I also received: that Christ died for our sins
according to the Scriptures,
4 and that He was buried, and
that He rose again the third day according to the Scriptures,
5 and that He was seen by
Cephas, then by the twelve.
6 After that He was seen by
over five hundred brethren at once, of whom the greater part remain to the
present, but some have fallen asleep.
7 After that He was seen by
James, then by all the apostles.
8 Then last of all He was
seen by me also, as by one born out of due time.
Praise
be to God that we have the Gospels of Jesus Christ which give us details of His
earthly life, death, burial and resurrection. Matthew, Mark, Luke and John are
powerful testimonies of our Lord and Savior’s life. However, there is more to
the story and more to the plan of Jesus. So, let’s turn our attention to the
Book of Acts and begin to see how Jesus continued to work His plan after His
resurrection as He prepared people to take the next step. Jesus said, I will
build My Church!
Before
we begin to read from Acts 1:1, allow me to remind us all that the Old
Testament covers a period of approximately 4000 years and reveals God working
through generation after generation to bring Messiah to a lost and hurting
world. The New Testament however covers a period of only about 40 years and
challenges each successive generation to see what can happen when a few people
give their lives to Christ, are filled with the Holy Spirit, and begin working
with Him to accomplish the Great Commission in their world. The New Testament
is a snapshot, if you will, a single account or testimony of what God can
through one home group when they give their lives over to Him and His plan.
Acts 1 NKJV
1 ¶ The former account I
made, O Theophilus, of all that Jesus began both to do and teach,
2 until the day in which He
was taken up, after He through the Holy Spirit had given commandments to the
apostles whom He had chosen,
·
After Jesus was taken up, He continued to
give commandments through the Holy Spirit.
·
Jesus is still in charge and is still working
to accomplish His plan.
3 to whom He also presented
Himself alive after His suffering by many infallible proofs, being seen by them
during forty days and speaking of the things pertaining to the kingdom of God.
·
The Kingdom does not come with observation.
(Luke 17:20)
·
The Kingdom of God is within you. (Luke
17:21)
·
The Kingdom of God is righteous, peace and
joy in the Holy Spirit. (Romans 14:17)
·
The Kingdom is like a treasure hidden in a
field … (Matthew 13:44)
·
Unless you receive Christ with humility as a
child … (Matthew 18:3ff)
4 And being assembled
together with them, He commanded them not to depart from Jerusalem, but
to wait for the Promise of the Father, “which,” He said, “you have heard
from Me;
5 “for John truly baptized
with water, but you shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from
now.”
6 ¶ Therefore, when they had
come together, they asked Him, saying, “Lord, will You at this time restore the
kingdom to Israel?”
·
Once again, even after His resurrection,
those closest to Him continued to question Jesus about restoring the kingdom to
Israel.
·
They were still expecting a physical kingdom
to be established on the earth at that time which would bring down their
enemies, specifically the Romans at this point in history.
7 And He said to them, “It is
not for you to know times or seasons which the Father has put in His own
authority.
8 “But you shall receive
power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be witnesses to Me
in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.”
9 Now when He had spoken
these things, while they watched, He was taken up, and a cloud received Him out
of their sight.
10 And while they looked
steadfastly toward heaven as He went up, behold, two men stood by them in white
apparel,
11 who also said, “Men of
Galilee, why do you stand gazing up into heaven? This same Jesus, who
was taken up from you into heaven, will so come in like manner as you saw Him
go into heaven.”
12 ¶ Then they returned to
Jerusalem from the mount called Olivet, which is near Jerusalem, a Sabbath
day’s journey.
13 And when they had entered,
they went up into the upper room where they were staying: Peter, James, John,
and Andrew; Philip and Thomas; Bartholomew and Matthew; James the son of
Alphaeus and Simon the Zealot; and Judas the son of James.
14 These all continued with
one accord in prayer and supplication, with the women and Mary the mother of
Jesus, and with His brothers.
It is evident when Jesus sat down on His
throne that He had finished His work on the earth through His own hands and had
take the position of Commander and Chief of the Church. The work Jesus
continues to do today is done by the Church through the power of the Holy
Spirit. The greatest work of the Church is to proclaim the Gospel of Jesus
Christ to each generation. This is done today in just the same way as it was
done 2000 years ago by those who were first filled with the Holy Spirit at
Pentecost as recorded in Acts chapter 2.
In only 40 years, one generation, this one
home group spread the Gospel and established Churches in Jerusalem, Judea,
Samaria, Antioch, Laodicea, Pergamos, Corinth, Ephesus, Philippi, Colosse,
Thyatira, all throughout Asia Minor, Caesarea, Damascus, Crete, Thessalonica,
and Rome just to name a few places. These 12 boys led the Church to evangelize
virtually their whole known world in only 40 years and not one of them even
owned a bicycle.
This picture given us by the New Testament is
the incumbent call on every generation and each individual until the Lord shall
return. It is our calling and it is our turn. As yet, it is still unfinished
business …
