In the Second Book...

… for John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now. Acts 1:5

Acts 1:1–5 – The Story of the Church: Living Into This Drama in the 21st Century
First Sunday in Lent – February 21, 2021 (am)

I’d get so excited for Christmas morning when I was a child that sleep had to sneak up on me after going to bed on Christmas Eve, or I’d never have given in to it! Even so I’d wake up well before the 7:00 target time that my parents had set for us! And we never opened presents early in our family! So, you can imagine the stir my father awakened in my heart one year when he told me several days before Christmas that there was a special gift for me under the tree and, if I guessed what it was, I could open it before Christmas! I was almost sick with anticipation!

I’m not going to tell you what the gift was because it would sound anticlimactic! Plus, I want you to identify with the yearning of anticipation more than the joy of receiving! That’s the feeling we’ll like get as we understand what Luke has written in these first five verses of the Book of Acts. But we’ll get to them in a few moments.

First let’s receive Some Introductory Help for Studying Acts (during which we’ll address a bit about The Nature of Acts as History and The Nature of Acts as Theology). Then we’ll move on to Luke’s Arresting Introduction to the Story of Acts.

Some Introductory Help for Studying Acts

Acts was written by Luke, the medical doctor (Col.4:14) and traveling companion (Act.16:10) of the Apostle Paul, as the latter half of his work on the man, ministry, and message of Jesus. So, Luke wrote more of the NT than any other writer.

Acts is really a single volume with his Gospel even though Luke referred to it here as his first book (1). This should be understood like a book division in a single volume, like the Psalms are divided into five books.

The purpose of Acts is really covered in Luke 1:1 Inasmuch as many have undertaken to compile a narrative of the things that have been accomplished among us, 2 just as those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and ministers of the word have delivered them to us, 3 it seemed good to me also, having followed all things closely for some time past, to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus, 4 that you may have certainty concerning the things you have been taught. It’s excellent history, masterfully told. We’ll see more of this as we move through the book.

The Nature of Acts as History

This is the story of the early church so by definition it’s more descriptive that prescriptive (more story than instruction). But history was done differently in the first century than it is today; the procedures of historians were different. So, even though Acts contains deep and rich theology, it’s not a theology book; it’s not trying to teach us something theological (like Romans or Galatians or even 1&2 Thessalonians). And it’s not trying to address some difficult issues (like 1&2 Corinthians or Colossians or 1&2 Timothy). It’s more about people, their character, lives, experience, and work more than about a belief-system and its doctrines.

Richard Longenecker’s (671) description helps: Underlying in antiquity all truly historical writing, as opposed to a mere chronicling of events, was the conviction that the actions and words of distinctive people in their respective periods represent more adequately the situation than any comments by the historian himself—that the ethos of a particular time is best conveyed through a portrayal of the ‘acts’ of its participants. And that’s just what Luke is doing here.

Plutarch’s biography of Alexander the Great is a good example. In it he wrote: It is not always in the most illustrious deeds that men’s virtues or vices may best be discerned, but often an action of small note, a short saying or a jest, will distinguish a person’s real character more than the greatest sieges and the most important battles. Therefore, as painters in their portraits labor the likeness in the face, and particularly the eyes, in which the peculiar turn of mind most appears, and run over the rest with a more careless hand, so we must be permitted to strike off the features of the soul in order to give a real likeness of these great men—leaving to others the circumstantial detail of their labors and achievements (in Longenecker 672).

In other words, ancient historians were more interested in the character of great people than even in their great accomplishments. Today it’s very different. People can gain wide acclaim due to their accomplishments almost regardless of their character! Remember the words of Antony following Julius Caesar’s death: The evil men do lives on after them; the good is oft interred with their bones (Act III, Scene ii). That’s ancient historiography, not modern!

Therefore, when we read Acts, we’ll hear Luke best as we attend to the character of the apostles, and that seen in the little actions and brief words Luke includes as much as in the great miracles they perform or the compelling sermons they preach or the immense suffering they endure.

The Nature of Acts as Theology

However, we should also keep in mind that while Acts is not primarily a work of theology (nor of evangelism, nor apologetics), it surely incorporates much theology. Howard Marshall (24-26) identified several rich theological facets within it.

For instance, the events in Acts were brought about by the will and purpose of God. So, the life of the church [is the] fulfillment of Scripture, meaning, the prophecies made in the OT governed the course of church history as it developed; the life of the church [is guided along] by God in Acts, sometimes by His [direct] intervention but surely also by the signs and wonders (5:12; 14:3; 15:12) He enabled.

Also, the message and mission of the church are saturated with abiding truths of immense theological importance, some of them appearing or alluded to right here in the opening paragraphs—the death, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus, [baptism] and the giving of the Holy Spirit, and the spread of God’s Kingdom through the worldwide advance of the gospel (8).

Much insight is also given on the life and organization of the early church—preaching, prayer, evangelism, administration, and its hope of the resurrection.

So, even though we must be very careful how we use the Book of Acts to build our theology, we still need to grant that much of the theology we learn in Scripture is interlaced with and illustrated in the life and experience of the early church that is narrated in its pages.

Luke’s Arresting Introduction to the Story of Acts

And here’s where we engage that excitement I was talking about as we began. Luke explicitly identifies or links this work with his Gospel record, addressing both to Theophilus (1; Luk.1:3) and referencing the first book (1) here. He concerned himself there with all that Jesus began to do and teach, until the day when he was taken up (1-2), [ascended] back to the Father. So, the ascension of Jesus was the dividing point in the middle of Luke’s two-part book; he finished His Gospel with a brief account of that event (Luk.24:50-53) and picks up with it here (6-11), but in a bit more detail this time.

The commands (2) Jesus [gave] to the apostles is likely referring to His instruction after His resurrection and finishing with His words just before His [ascension], which included the great commission (Luk.24:45-47), a charge Luke will include here again (8) in a much more pithy and programmatic way.

Through the Holy Spirit (2) means these guys were receiving special instruction that came with special enabling to hear it and act on it (Stott 34-36). And apostles is an interesting word choice, over the more common disciples from the Gospels. But Luke had used apostles from the beginning as a name for the primary twelve disciples (Luk.6:13). Yet even so, it will become clear here in Acts that [apostles] stretches to refer to different ones, like Barnabas and Paul (14:14), who were uniquely called and enabled by the Spirit to spread the gospel and lay the foundation of the church (cf. Marshall 61).

Regardless…, 3 [Jesus] presented himself alive to them after his suffering, after his [death, burial, and resurrection], and he presented himself by many proofs, appearing to them during forty days and speaking about the kingdom of God. These proofs appear near the end of all four Gospels, but in Luke’s record most recently with Jesus’ appearance to the two men on the road to Emmaus (Luk,24:13-35) followed by His sudden presence with these two and the eleven back in Jerusalem (Luk.24:36-49) where they returned immediately after Jesus vanished from their sight (31) on the road. When Jesus suddenly stood among them (36), He reassured them that He was raised from the dead, and that it really was Him—he showed them his hands and his feet (40)—and while they still disbelieved, for joy and were marveling! (41) It was like Christmas morning! They were so excited they didn’t know how to act! They couldn’t believe it! Yet He was standing their right in front of them asking for food!  

But that’s not the end of the story! Back here in Act.1, what was only a vague mention in Luke 24:49 is stated with unmasked clarity in v.4-5! Jesus ordered them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the promise of the Father, which, he said, “you heard from me; for John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now.” This is the same Holy Spirit Who has been promised as part of a new covenant relationship with God in which He’ll dwell within His people! He cleanses them from sin and takes up residence within them, making them collectively (Eph.2:20), and even individually (1Co.6:19), His Temple! This is the Spirit Who was promised in Isaiah 32:15; 44:3; Ezekiel 36:26; 39:29; Joel 2:28-32; and Zechariah 12:10, and then was also promised by Jesus to these disciples in John 14:15-17, 15:26-16:15.

So, these folk need to sit tight in Jerusalem and wait until God shows up, not many days from now! (5) And when He does, the story of Acts, the story of the church, our story, will truly get started in earnest!

Conclusion

This is the Book we’ll be studying for the next several months! And this is the story it’ll be telling—the story of the fulfillment of God’s promise to cleanse [us] and put [His] Spirit within [us] (Eze.36:25-27), and the story of the people in whom this promise was first fulfilled.

And the good news for us today is that this is also our story! We may not be among those original apostles on whose [ministry] God established the church (Eph.2:20), but we’re recipients of the same Spirit they were promised and, as we’ll see, soon received! That Spirit unites us here, today!

This is what it means to be the church; this is what it looks like; God has come to dwell with His people, and you and I are numbered among them in Christ!

*********** 

Gempf, Conrad. “Acts,” in New Bible Commentary 21st Century Edition, edited by D. A. Carson, R. T. France, J. A. Motyer, and G. J. Wenham, 1066-114. Leicester, Eng.: InterVarsity, 1994.

Longenecker, Richard N. “Acts,” in Expositor’s Bible Commentary, volume 10, edited by Tremper Longman III and David E. Garland, 665-1102. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2007.

Marshall, I. Howard. Acts. Volume 5, Tyndale New Testament Commentaries. Downers Grove: InterVarsity, 1980.

Polhill, John B. Acts. Volume 26, The New American Commentary. Nashville: Broadman & Holman, 1992.

_____. Study notes on Acts. In ESV Study Bible. Wheaton: Crossway, 2008.

Stott, John. The Message of Acts. Leicester, Eng.: InterVarsity, 1990. (Originally, The Spirit, the Church, and the World)

Next Sunday: Things We Can Know and Things We Can't, Acts 1:6–26