A Summer of Acts

We are planning to spend the next eight Sundays in the book of Acts – eight different episodes or stories, one for each week. This morning, I want to describe briefly how to read and apply the book of Acts, and then I want to practice what I preach, using chapter 1.

How to Read the Bible

These opening comments apply to the whole of Scripture, and especially to Acts. Remember this basic rule: The Bible was not written to us; the Bible was written for us.

Not to us: Acts was written to Gentiles (non-Jews) who were interested in who Jesus was. They were also interested in the group of Jewish believers who came into being as followers of Jesus. In Luke 1:1-4, the author tells us that he is writing so that “Theophilus”, who represents these non-Jewish seekers, can know the truth about Jesus. In Acts, the author continues the story [“The Story by Luke, volume 2”), so that they can know what happened to the followers of Jesus in the first 30 years or so.

The fact that Luke wrote to these particular people is important. He dealt with their issues – such as their concern that only Jews could become Christians. [Luke says: No! The gospel is for everyone!] He refers to events that we don’t know about and could assume that his readers did – such as the way that Paul can appeal to Caesar, the way that we appeal to the Supreme Court of Canada. [Except, of course, that Paul, as a Roman citizen, knew that Caesar would hear his appeal.] This is the story of the first church in Jerusalem and Antioch and Rome, not of the Mennonite Church of Manitoba.

Written for us: Nevertheless, Acts was written for us. This is not an obvious point. The fact that the Bible is an old book, a very old book, means that we may wonder why we should read it so carefully. It is written to people who lived a long time ago and in a very different culture than we do. Why should we read it at all?

Luke-Acts claims to be the story about the Creator of the Universe coming into human existence. Jesus is God incarnate, the one in whom God comes to earth. The story of God’s coming in Jesus and of how humankind received Jesus and of how God transformed their lives is worth knowing.

My specialty is the study of culture. Sometimes we wonder if people from other cultures have anything in common with us, then I remember a quote from anthropologist Walter Goldschmidt: “People are more alike than cultures are different.” The fact is that the people in Acts are like us, and their experience of God’s presence is a lot like ours.

The Function of Story

We read the Bible as a whole – and the book of Acts in particular – as a story that shapes our lives, not primarily as a rule book that tells us what to do. Of course, the Bible has some prescriptive statements, such as “God has shown you what is good and what God requires of you: to do justice and love mercy and to walk humbly with God.” Similarly, Jesus gives us teaching in the Sermon on the Mount that may not be rules per se, but they are prescriptions about how to live. The point is that these prescriptions come in a story, and we don’t apply the “rules” without recognizing the larger story that shapes us into the kind of people God wants.

Our society also has a number of big stories that it tells us repeatedly. These stories shape us, even when we don’t realise what they are doing. Lois and I enjoy “Murdoch Mysteries”, and I find it interesting to listen to the subtext that comes through. There are ideas such as “People 100 years ago might have been decent people in their personal lives, but in fact as a whole they were prejudiced and bound by the rules of society in the 1900s. We are so fortunate to live in the 21^st Century, when we know what is really good for everyone.” I really like the series, but it is not obvious to me that our society is better or worse than other societies. We are better in some ways today and worse in others, so I resist the story’s shaping effect.

Nevertheless, we live with our culture’s stories, shaping us and moulding us even when we resist them. It is important, then, to pay attention to God’s story – not to ask, “Do we copy them in the way they acted?” but to allow God to shape and mould us into the kind of people God wants in this world. So we ask over and over again, “What kind of people was God shaping in Acts? How can we be more like them in God’s image?”

Acts 1

In the passage we read this morning from Acts 1, the disciples gather together in Jerusalem, waiting for the Holy Spirit to come as Jesus had instructed them. Listen to the story for its overall themes, not for specific things we should do.

An Example

My forebears in the Brethren in Christ Church thought that this chapter tells us how to choose ministers. A hundred years ago, they used a lottery for ministers based on Acts 1. When they needed a new minister to join the team that led the church, the elders would choose a slate of men they felt were qualified. In the selection service, then, each of the candidates would walk to the front and choose a Bible from the Bibles that had been placed there. Then they would open the Bible they had chosen. The one who found the piece of paper that had been placed in one Bible only was the new minister.

These dear brothers and sisters were sincere and full of faith, but I think they misread Acts 1. Even the New Testament did not hold to this model in other places. The only sense in which Paul won the lottery was that he was struck down on the road to Damascus. We have no suggestion that the deacons were chosen in Acts 6 by any form of lottery. Rather, they were simply chosen. It seems as though the precise form used is secondary to something deeper.

Finding that “something deeper” is what we want to do this Summer. We listen for the deeper matters that shaped the disciples’ lives. That deeper reality takes expression in new forms in our lives today. What is the “something deeper” in Acts 1? Two basic thoughts seem clear to me:

•          Jesus says, “Wait for the Spirit”, and the disciples wait in prayer.
•          Jesus says, “You will be my witnesses”, and the disciples become witnesses to Jesus’ resurrection throughout the rest of Acts.

 Bringing This Home

Two basic thoughts then: 1) We live in the presence of the Holy Spirit and by the power of the Holy Spirit; and 2) We are witnesses of what it means to express the reign of God in our lives in this world. This life in the Spirit is life in the kingdom. We are the ones whose lives show what Jesus looks like in today’s world. We are witnesses to the reality of the resurrection in Canada today. Let’s explore these two thoughts briefly.

Living in/by the Spirit: When we read the story of Jesus in the four gospels, that story continues in the world through the Holy Spirit. Jesus makes it clear in Acts 1 that he continues to be with the disciples through the Spirit. So we seek the Spirit of God. We open ourselves to the Spirit of God. We ask God continually for more and more of God’s Spirit.

That’s why the disciples spent so much time in prayer in the book of Acts. Someone has said that nothing important happens in Acts without the presence of the Spirit and without prayer. Do we want to know how to live in community? Pray about it. Do we wonder what shape our worship services should take? Pray about it. Do we wonder how to relate to our brothers and sisters at Manigotagan? Pray about it. We are used to making our plans and carrying them out. We’re Mennonites, and Mennos are into doing things and doing them well. Add prayer to the doing. Seek God’s Spirit in the doing. Recognize that as the poet says, “new occasions teach new duties” – that is, we ask again how God wants us to live today in the situations we face today.

Being Witnesses: In Acts 1, the apostles are to bear witness specifically to the resurrection of Jesus. The resurrection was the manifestation of God’s kingdom in the world. As one commentator puts it: “In Luke, Jesus came preaching the kingdom, and in Acts, the apostles came preaching Jesus.” The coming of Jesus is the coming of God’s reign. We are witnesses to the reality of God’s Reign in our lives in this community. No matter how flawed we are, no matter how inadequate we feel, we make Jesus present as the body of Christ in our community.

Look at the book of Acts for a moment. Who are these apostles? Acts 1 names them: Peter, John, James and Andrew; Philip and Thomas, Bartholomew and Matthew; James son of Alphaeus and Simon the Zealot, and Judas son of James. They choose Matthias to make out the Twelve. Later in the story, we meet Stephen and Barnabas and Phillip and Paul. Do you notice something? No women! Where were the women? After naming the Eleven, Luke adds these words: “They all joined together constantly in prayer, along with the women and Mary the mother of Jesus, and with his brothers.” Why are the women not named?

I know that the whole book does name some of the women in the story – Lydia, Dorcas, Sapphira, Priscilla, but the point is clear: The story gives more names of the men, even though the writer knew that the women were also there.

First Century Israel was a patriarchal society. The Roman Empire in the First Century was even more so. Becoming Christian elevated the status of women within the group somewhat, but it did not overturn the basic fact of the way that women were second class citizens. Paul tells us that in Christ there are no men or women – all are one in Christ Jesus [Galatians 3:11], but the lesson took a long time to percolate through. Even when it did take effect, male privilege reasserted itself. Yet God worked through these men and women! A flawed society, with a basic structure that contradicts our own egalitarian commitments deeply, yet God worked through people who had accepted the norms of their own time and place. Similarly, we are part of a flawed messed-up world, and we ourselves have our own problems. These do not disqualify us from being witnesses to God’s presence. The only requirement is that we open ourselves to God’s presence in our lives. God is ready to work in us, no matter how inadequate we think we are.

Conclusion

There you have it. We will spend a Summer of Acts listening to stories of God’s work in our world. These stories shape us, because the book of Acts is still being written in you and me and in this church. When God’s Spirit moves in us, and we act in our community and in our world, we become God’s witnesses to the reality of the death and resurrection of Jesus.

Part of what I am saying is that we are witnesses: We tell our stories. I want to finish with a memory from my own experience. Back in 1981 or 1982, we lived in Lancaster County, where I was a new pastor at Speedwell Heights BIC Church. I remember working on a sermon based on Psalm 1: “Blessed is the one who walks not in the counsel of the ungodly … That person is planted by rivers of water, and they shall not wither, and whatever they do will prosper.” I was struggling with the sermon, because I knew that not everyone in my congregation who loved the Lord was prospering. I went to a chair in our living room (which was beside my study) and sat down to think about this. I had some sort of out-of-body experience. I can’t describe it better than that. I was standing on a hillside, from where I could see three crosses. It wasn’t a vision. I was just there.

That was the only answer I ever had – to see Jesus hanging on the cross and know that whatever the people in my church were hurting with, Jesus was hurting with it too. Stanley Hauerwas has said that the only way the world can know the gospel of the cross is true is by reading the life of the church in their community.

This example from my life was a private and personal experience. We need communal and social examples as well. The life of the church is communal, and it is our life together that is the most powerful witness for the reality of Christ’s reign on earth. We model our life on the life of Jesus, witnesses to the truth of God’s coming into our world. If the congregation has a cross-shaped life, people can know the gospel is true. That’s what Jesus was saying. “You will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you, and you will be my witnesses.”

Steinbach Mennonite Church

7 July 2019 

Texts

Psalm 78

Verses 1 to 7: My people, hear my teaching; listen to the words of my mouth. I will open my mouth with a parable; I will utter hidden things, things from of old—things we have heard and known, things our ancestors have told us. We will not hide them from their descendants; we will tell the next generation the praiseworthy deeds of the Lord, his power, and the wonders he has done.

He decreed statutes for Jacob and established the law in Israel, which he commanded our ancestors to teach their children, so the next generation would know them, even the children yet to be born, and they in turn would tell their children. Then they would put their trust in God and would not forget his deeds but would keep his commands.

Acts 1

Jesus Taken Up Into Heaven

In my former book, Theophilus, I wrote about all that Jesus began to do and to teach until the day he was taken up to heaven, after giving instructions through the Holy Spirit to the apostles he had chosen. After his suffering, he presented himself to them and gave many convincing proofs that he was alive. He appeared to them over a period of forty days and spoke about the kingdom of God. On one occasion, while he was eating with them, he gave them this command: “Do not leave Jerusalem, but wait for the gift my Father promised, which you have heard me speak about. For John baptized with water, but in a few days you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit.”

Then they gathered around him and asked him, “Lord, are you at this time going to restore the kingdom to Israel?” He said to them: “It is not for you to know the times or dates the Father has set by his own authority. But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”

After he said this, he was taken up before their very eyes, and a cloud hid him from their sight.

They were looking intently up into the sky as he was going, when suddenly two men dressed in white stood beside them. “Men of Galilee,” they said, “why do you stand here looking into the sky? This same Jesus, who has been taken from you into heaven, will come back in the same way you have seen him go into heaven.” 

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Matthias Chosen to Replace Judas

Then the apostles returned to Jerusalem from the hill called the Mount of Olives, a Sabbath day’s walk from the city. When they arrived, they went upstairs to the room where they were staying. Those present were Peter, John, James and Andrew; Philip and Thomas, Bartholomew and Matthew; James son of Alphaeus and Simon the Zealot, and Judas son of James. They all joined together constantly in prayer, along with the women and Mary the mother of Jesus, and with his brothers.

In those days Peter stood up among the believers (a group numbering about a hundred and twenty) and said, “Brothers and sisters, the Scripture had to be fulfilled in which the Holy Spirit spoke long ago through David concerning Judas, who served as guide for those who arrested Jesus. He was one of our number and shared in our ministry.”

With the payment he received for his wickedness, Judas bought a field; there he fell headlong, his body burst open and all his intestines spilled out. Everyone in Jerusalem heard about this, so they called that field in their language Akeldama, that is, Field of Blood.) “For,” said Peter, “it is written in the Book of Psalms: ‘May his place be deserted; let there be no one to dwell in it,’ and, ‘May another take his place of leadership.’ Therefore it is necessary to choose one of the men who have been with us the whole time the Lord Jesus was living among us, beginning from John’s baptism to the time when Jesus was taken up from us. For one of these must become a witness with us of his resurrection.”

So they nominated two men: Joseph called Barsabbas (also known as Justus) and Matthias. Then they prayed, “Lord, you know everyone’s heart. Show us which of these two you have chosen to take over this apostolic ministry, which Judas left to go where he belongs.” Then they cast lots, and the lot fell to Matthias; so he was added to the eleven apostles.