Well, it is going to be a marvelous evening and I hope that you'll be back tonight at six o'clock. I'm going to wait until they disappear to say to you that sometimes I've been a little disappointed in the support that our congregation has given to our ministry of music. I look back at some of the special times we've had like a Christmas time and frankly the congregation wasn't here. If it hadn't been for a lot of guests, it would really have been embarrassing.
I hope tonight that you will plan to be here as part of the Grace congregation. And if you've got other plans, you'll cancel them or somehow fold them in so that you can come and be present. Let's show these folks who have dedicated a great deal to add so much to our worship service each week how much we appreciate what they do. And together we'll praise the Lord too. Thank you. Let me ask you a personal question. If something happened to you, who would do your work?
Who would finish up all of those projects that you have lying around the house? I thought about this a few years ago when my mother died. When I walked into the house, there was the chair that she sat in until just the day before. And around the chair were several projects that she had been working on with her needlework, but her hands would never finish them. And later when I looked in the refrigerator, I saw food that she had bought in order to prepare for her husband and her family.
The food that she would never again touch. Someone else would need to fix that food for others to eat. I looked at her garden, a garden that she had planted that spring, a garden that she had labored over and watered and taken care of. And now in the time when she should be harvesting the fruit of that garden, someone else would have to pick those beans and tomatoes and melons because she wasn't going to work there anymore. If you left this week unexpectedly, who would finish your work for you?
Our text today records the time that Jesus left. It was not an unexpected leaving. It was a time that he knew was coming and he prepared for it. Let's read about it in Acts chapter 1. We're going to see that Jesus made preparation for his work to continue. I begin reading in verse 1 of Acts 1. The first account I composed, Theophilus, about all that Jesus began to do and teach.
Luke is here acknowledging that he has written another narrative, another letter, another document of history that of course is the book we call the Gospel of Luke in the New Testament. And he says, Theophilus, this is the gentleman to whom he was addressing both of these works of history. He says, in the first one I told you about those things that Jesus began to do and to teach. Until the day when he was taken up, 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, and gathering them together, he commanded them not to leave Jerusalem, but to wait for that which the Father had promised, which he said, you have heard of me. For John baptized with water, but you shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now.
And so when they had come together, they were asking him, saying, Lord, is it this time you are restoring the kingdom to Israel? He said to them, it is not for you to know times or epochs, which the Father has fixed by his own authority. But you shall 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 remotest part of the earth.
And after he had said these things, he was lifted up while they were looking on, and a cloud received him out of their sight. And as they were gazing intently into the sky while he was departing, behold, two men in white clothing stood beside them. And they said also, men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into the sky? This Jesus, who has been taken up from you into heaven, will come in just the same way as you have watched him go into heaven.
For 40 days after Jesus' resurrection, he demonstrated with convincing proofs the fact that he was alive. He taught his followers more about the kingdom of God, and then he left. Then he returned to heaven. However, he did not leave his work behind unattended to. He left it in the hands of his followers, and indeed, it makes it clear in the Bible that he only continued to do his work even though he was gone. He continued to do his work through them, though he was in heaven.
He left because that was the best way for him to accomplish his unfinished work. Now remember that the work of Jesus for our salvation was finished at the cross. No completion is needed to that. Nothing ever needs to be added. When he said it is finished, he meant it. The blood that had been shed on the cross of Calvary was sufficient for the sins of all for all time. Once and for all, the price was paid. The finished work of Christ. But there is still today the unfinished work of Christ.
That is the work that he has left behind for us to do. The risen King continues yet today in 1995 his work. He continues it through his followers, we who are the spiritual descendants of those that are spoken of in Acts chapter 1. And when Jesus left, he left us all that we need to continue the work that he began. I want you to notice in our text that he left us a power to appropriate, a program to emulate, and a promise to motivate. Let's talk about the power that he gave us to appropriate.
Jesus had already spoken to his followers about the promise of the Father. This is the promise that he mentions again in verse 4. Jesus had told them on the night before he was crucified that he would send another comforter to them, one just like himself, who would help them, who would teach them, who would be with them always. That was the promise of the Holy Spirit. And he told these followers to wait in Jerusalem for the fulfillment of that promise.
Most of us would rather God say anything to us than wait. We're action people. We want to get on with it. We've got a job to do. Let's do it. But Jesus told the disciples to wait in Jerusalem. Now there was a reason for that. Our God is a God of order. Everything that God does makes perfect sense. The only problem is that we don't have the same sense that God does. He told them to wait. And we understand now why, because God wanted the Holy Spirit to come on the day of Pentecost.
That's what that Old Testament feast had been predicting and signifying all those years. And so Jesus said, wait in Jerusalem. And ten days later, the Spirit of God came. M.H. Lout said, God's best gifts come slowly. We're in a hurry to get God's gifts, aren't we? We sense genuinely our need for those gifts. And we want them so we can put them into use. We want the crisis to be over. We want the need to be met. We want it now. That's truly American, isn't it?
I want what I want and I want it now. But God's best gifts come slowly. God is as much concerned about our character as he is about the gift that he wants to give us. The blessing that he wants to impart to us. And so there are times that we wait. I think of Paul, who in the very pinnacle of his ministry was put into prison for two years and waited. How much he could have done in two years of time. How many more miles he could have put on that worn out body of his.
Why he could have gone places that he never got in his lifetime if he had only had that two years. But God allowed Paul to wait two years in a prison cell in Caesarea. And then he went to Rome. And I think of Moses. Moses understood early that he was to be the one who would deliver God's people. And he found a way to do it. Except it wasn't God's way and so he waited. Not only the 40 years of his young manhood, but the 40 years of his middle age. I like to think of 80 as middle age anymore.
He waited in Midian, took care of sheep. He waited and waited and waited year after year after year until he figured it was too late or he had misunderstood God's will or he wasn't qualified. Something had happened but he wasn't going to be the one now. And then God lit that bush on fire and called Moses to do his work. And think of Jesus. Why didn't he begin his public ministry at 13? At 12 he could confound the doctors of theology in Jerusalem. He knew more than they did about God.
Why didn't he begin a teenage ministry? After all there are churches that ordain young men to ministry at 16 years of age. In Southern Baptist. Or at least at 20 or 21. Why didn't Jesus begin then? How many more lives he could have touched? How many more miracles he could have done? But God's purpose was for him to wait until he was 30. We get in a big hurry with God. God told these disciples, now you wait in Jerusalem. You wait for the promise of the Father.
And the reason was that they needed to be empowered for the work that God wanted them to do. God gave them a power to appropriate when the Spirit of the Lord came. And I tell you what an amazing sight and sound and miracle show that was when the Spirit of God came. They had the sound of the rushing wind, which is what reminded me of the introduction of this offering, the wind blowing. And the fire that was over the heads of the disciples.
And the tongues that they were able to speak in, the languages of all those people gathered there at the temple for the feast of Pentecost. What an amazing display God put on the day of Pentecost. God gave them power. It was the power that they needed to fulfill the work that Jesus was leaving behind for them to do. How do we tap into that power? The answer is by faith.
I think Paul gives us a key verse in Colossians 2 when he says, as you therefore have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him. In other words, as we have received Him by faith into our lives, so now we are to walk, to conduct ourselves by faith. In other words, you and I have resident within us, the Holy Spirit. Our need now is to tap into that power. George Duncan once went to visit some friends in the English countryside.
For many years these friends had lived in an old, run-down English farmhouse. To Duncan's surprise, he discovered that the house had been completely remodeled when he went there. The people had installed new lights, an electric stove, and many other pieces of modern equipment. But even he was surprised to see that the lady of the house was still using a kerosene stove for cooking, and she had lit oil lamps for light in the house.
He inquired about this, and she said, well George, don't look so confused. We've had a great change here, but we haven't turned on the power yet. A lot of Christians are living just that way. There's been a tremendous change, a radical change, because Jesus Christ has come into the life, but somehow the power hasn't been turned on yet. I think the easiest concept to use to illustrate how that power is turned on is the concept of spiritual breathing. It's nothing new, it's old.
I heard it many, many years ago. But in order to experience the release of the power that is within us, we need to breathe spiritually. That means to first exhale, to get rid of the sin in our lives by confessing them to God. And then we need to inhale, which means to ask the Holy Spirit to take charge again in our lives and yield ourselves to Him. If you will keep that simple concept in your mind and learn to practice it in your life, it will release the power of God in new ways in you.
Spiritual breathing, exhaling, then reappropriating, inhaling. Jesus Christ has left to us all that we need that we might continue His work. It begins with the power that He has left us in the Holy Spirit to appropriate for our lives. As we have received Christ Jesus, so now let's walk in Him and understand that when we sin, it cuts off the power. And as long as that sin is there unconfessed, the power is going to be off.
But if we'll just exhale, confess the sin, and then inhale by appropriating by faith the Holy Spirit, and then trust that the Holy Spirit is filling us and controlling us, we'll walk in newness of power and do Jesus' work for us. Secondly, He gave us a program to emulate. His followers were given a strategy. He said to them, Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, the uttermost parts of the earth. There's a strategy there that is geographical. But it's also cultural. We have to understand that or we miss it.
Jerusalem and Judea were safe. See that was Jewish territory. But when you get into Samaria, you're in trouble because those are half-breeds up there. Those Samaritans are the descendants of Jews and Assyrians. They're no good. They're on the other side of the track. But you have to admit that at least the Samaritans are half-Jewish. You get beyond Samaria and you get into the uttermost parts of the earth where the dogs live, the Gentiles.
The strategy that Jesus gave them involved not only geography, it involved culture. And what He is saying is if we're going to do His work, we have to be willing to pierce through our cultural prejudices to reach other people. Even those people that we in our humanness may think less of. We're to acknowledge that that is wrong and to love them for Jesus' sake. The disciples were reluctant to do this. Finally the Lord had to bring persecution on them in Jerusalem to kick them out into Samaria.
Read about it in Acts chapter 8. And then the Lord had to send a vision to Peter so that he would go to Cornelius who was a God-fearing Gentile. And he did. He went to Cornelius and Cornelius became the first Gentile to trust the Lord Jesus Christ. Beginning in Acts chapter 11 you have the Gospel then going to the uttermost parts of the earth. He fulfilled the strategy even though God had to put pressure on them to do it. He does the same thing to us.
Because we too are reluctant to go beyond our comfort zones. We are reluctant to go beyond those barriers that we set up in our culture. And so God does what is necessary to kick us beyond those barriers, those zones, to reach the people that he loves who are out there in the uttermost parts of the earth. We have a program to emulate that God gave us. This program has a purpose to it.
The reaching of the Gentiles became so successful and so controversial that a great church council was called in Jerusalem to settle the issue. The Jews were very concerned, the Jewish believers, the Jewish Christians were very concerned in Jerusalem that Gentiles were being added to the church who hadn't first undergone Jewish rituals. And so they began to send out teachers from Jerusalem who said you have to be circumcised before you can be a Christian and be a part of the church.
Paul was so alarmed by this and others were so alarmed by it that there was this council called in Jerusalem, read about it in Acts 15. Barnabas and Paul and others went down to up to Jerusalem from Antioch which was their headquarters. Antioch and Syria, Gentile territory. And they made their way from Antioch down through Phoenicia and Samaria and then to Jerusalem. They had a great conversation about this. And Peter made some comments about what happened with Cornelius.
And Barnabas and Paul began to share what had happened on their missionary journey up into Asia Minor. And then James who was the chairman of the board in Jerusalem who was the head elder spoke up and settled the whole issue. And he said to his Jewish brothers there gathered, in essence he said this, what we're doing is wrong. Let's only cause the Gentiles to do the minimal, what is necessary that may not cause a stun or stumbling block to the Jews. But let's not put upon them the law of Moses.
And he said God is about this purpose in the world. He is taking out a people for his name. I love that statement. Because in that one statement James sums it up. He tells us what Jesus' work is in this age. He is out there taking out a people for his namesake. That's the work that he's called you and me to participate in. To share the gospel in such a way that people who are now outside of the family of God, who are not part of God's work, will hear the gospel and be led to believe it.
And then be called out by God from the world. Called out to be a part of the church of Jesus Christ. That is the work that he has called you and me to be a part of. I remember one time having a bit of food at a picnic in the outside and there were some ants around the picnic table. And so I dropped some food just to see what the ants would do. And of course they came to the food and took off little bits and pieces of it, just a few of them, and they carried it away and I lost track of them.
But it wasn't too long before I looked again at that piece of food and there was a whole stream of ants who had come to carry it away to their nest. What had happened? Those ants who had been out scavenging for food found some. They did not eat it all themselves. They took pieces of it back to their nest, leaving a trail along the way, a chemical trail, so that the other ants in the nest would know that they had found food and can follow the trail back to where the food was.
I want to submit to you that that is your job in mind. We are to leave a trail for others to follow to find Jesus Christ. And by the sweetness of our lives, by the change and the transformation in us, we are to attract others to come to Him. When Jesus left and went back to heaven, He left to His followers a power to appropriate and a program to emulate. But He also left a promise to motivate. Jesus continues His work today as He was then working through His followers.
But one day that work will be done. One day the church will be complete. This body of believers that God is calling out for His Son in this age, composed of Gentile and Jew, this body of believers that we call the church will be completed. There is an elect number to the church. And once that number has been fulfilled, once that last person has trusted Jesus Christ as Savior, you can expect the rapture to take place momentarily.
Jesus disappeared into heaven and the angels in white garb appeared. I think what happened on that day was that Jesus was lifted up from the ground. He ascended. And the Lord just pulled back the curtains to the heavenly dimension, which in my opinion is all around us. He just pulled back the curtains and Jesus went back and the curtains shut. And then two angels stepped out on the platform as it were and they said, fellas, you guys from Galilee, why are you standing here?
This same Jesus is going to come again. You see, they needed a promise to motivate them. And that promise was that Jesus was coming back. That they needn't stand there and grieve that He was no longer with them. Nor should they stand there wondering what had happened and trying to figure this out where Jesus had gone. They said, don't worry about that, fellas. He's coming back again just like you saw Him go away. That promise is still valid today. Jesus is coming again.
One day He is going to step back through that curtain in the heavens and when He does, He is going to call out to Himself the church in what we call the rapture, the catching away of the church. And that will happen. I can assure you that will happen when the last person who is numbered to be a part of the church is saved. Don't you wish you knew what that number was and who it was? Why we would head straight for that person.
We make all haste to find that address and go to that door and knock on the door and say, hey, I've got news for you. But that isn't what the Lord has done. He hasn't told us that number. He hasn't given us that name. Because He wants us just to keep spreading the word to everybody. He knows who the last one is.
And the motivation is that as you and I do Jesus' work, as we witness, as we carry the Gospel to the uttermost parts of the earth, as we're doing His work, His work is one day going to be finished and Jesus is going to come back. And we'll be with the Lord. What a motivation. What a promise God has given to us. Sooner or later, He will come. The sooner we finish His work, the sooner He will come. Are you watching? Are you waiting for the Savior?
Donald Barnhouse is a great Bible teacher of another generation, home with the Lord now, I suppose 30 some years. Barnhouse told about a Scottish sailing vessel that was returning home after many days at sea. As they got closer to the shore, the sailors got on deck and gazed eagerly toward the shore where their loved ones would be gathered. The captain got out his binoculars and began to look. And as he did, he said, well, I see Bill's Mary, she's there. And there's Tom's Margaret.
And there's David's Anne. And one by one, he began to name all the wives that he could see on the shore. But there was one man's wife who wasn't there. He got off the ship heavy hearted and walked directly to his home, to his cottage. And as he opened the door, she ran over to meet him and said, oh honey, I've been waiting for you. But gently he replied, yes, you've been waiting, but the other men's wives were watching for them. It's one thing to wait for Jesus. We're called to watch for him.
The promise that ought to motivate you and me in the work that Jesus has left for us to do is that he could come today. That last one may trust the Savior today. And you, you may be the one that God has in mind to take the Gospel to that person. It's truly amazing to me that God has left this work to people like us. That he chooses to work through us and not through angels, not through more greatly gifted people but us. That he will accomplish his work through us.
Not one of those whom he has chosen will be overlooked or missed. All that the Father has given to Jesus will come to him and be included in his eternal reign. The question is not whether the continuing work of Jesus will be done because it will be done. But the question is whether we will be obedient to our part in it. Whether we will choose to be used of him or whether we will neglect the opportunity. And yet why would any follower neglect the opportunity when we have the power that we need.
When we have the program laid out for us. When we've got the promise to motivate us. Why would we not desire more than anything in life to serve him with honor and with faithfulness and commitment. Let that ring in our hearts that though the Savior has gone, gone away to heaven, he yet continues his work through you and me. What does he want to do today? What's his purpose this week for you to do? He's got something in mind.
Don't let the week pass without discovering what the Savior wants you to do as part of his work. And do it with all of your heart and be watching for him. Let's pray. Lord, I pray that we will understand that you have committed to us a great work. Forgive us when we seem to think that our work is more important. And what we have to do has greater significance than the work you want to do through us.
Lord Jesus, I pray that the work that we see in the book of Acts may be completed in Grace Church, Roseville. I pray that you will cause us as a body of people to be so filled with the Holy Spirit, so on target with the program that you've laid out for us, so aware of the promise that we're watching. Because of that, you're able to do much of your work through this congregation. Stir us, Lord, from lethargy. Stir us from laziness.
And give to our hearts a renewed commitment to the work of Jesus Christ. Would you stand with me, please? Before I close in prayer, would you with a bowed head just say, Lord, what do you want me to do this week? Lord, how can I serve you? Lord, what is the thing, what is the task you want to give to my charge? Lord, I will do it. Lord, I want to serve you. And if that's your heart, will you just double check to make sure that you're using the power that God's given you?
And if there's something there quenching the Holy Spirit, will you right now exhale that and confess it? And then inhale and ask the Holy Spirit to take charge again, to be in control of your life, to fill you with His power? He'll do it in an instant if by faith you'll just ask Him to. Oh, Lord Jesus, I pray that you will come quickly. But until that day that you come, may we serve faithfully. Amen.