Acts of the Apostles
Adrian Thornton

Acts is one of those books of the Bible that brings us right back to the beginning. It reminds us what the church is, where it came from, and what God always intended it to be. It is the origin story of the church, but it is also more than history. It is an invitation into the ongoing story of God.

Luke begins Acts by telling us that his former book was about “all that Jesus began to do and teach.” That word began matters. The work of Jesus did not finish with the ascension as though there was nothing left for his people to do. Jesus completed the work of salvation, but the mission of his kingdom continues through his Spirit-empowered church.

Some of our Bibles call this book The Acts of the Apostles, and I think that is a great name. Luke’s first book was, in a sense, the acts of Jesus. His second book is the Acts of the Apostles. Or as John Stott put it, Acts could be called “the continuing words and deeds of Jesus by his Spirit through his apostles.” In other words, Jesus is still at work, but now he is working through his church by the power of the Holy Spirit.

The disciples, however, still had a limited view of what Jesus was doing. After forty days of Jesus speaking to them about the kingdom of God, they still asked, “Lord, are you at this time going to restore the kingdom to Israel?” They were still thinking about their own nation, their own oppression under the Roman Empire. They wanted God to do something for them.

But Jesus lifts their eyes to something bigger. “You will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you, and you will be my witnesses.” Not power to become soldiers. Not power to seize political control. Not power to restore one nation over another. Power to be witnesses of Jesus in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.

It comes through ordinary people filled with the Spirit, living as witnesses to the life, death, resurrection, and reign of Jesus.

That means Acts is not just a story about what happened back then. It is a story that continues in us. The disciples were waiting for God to do something for them, but God wanted to do something through them. And the same is true for us. Jesus has come. The Spirit has been given. Now we are called to go.