Week 46

Matthew 28:9-20, Mark 16:9-20, Luke 24:13-53, John 20:11-21:25

In each of these final chapters of the gospels we see snippets of the Lord’s appearing to His disciples, which occurred over the course of some 40 days.  He appeared to two of them on the road to Emmaus, where He gave them an intense Bible study as they walked about 7 miles, explaining all that the scriptures said about Him, and why He came to die, and then be raised from the dead.  Jesus appeared to the apostles several times in Jerusalem, and also met with them in Galilee during this period of time.  At the Sea of Galilee the Lord re-confirms His commission upon Peter, and commanding that he lead like a shepherd of Christ’s sheep.

In these weeks following the Lord’s resurrection, we’re told later that He appeared to many believers (more than 500 - 1 Corinthians 15:6), so even though Jesus did not appear to the Jews, or to unbelievers, His resurrection was witnessed by hundreds of disciples before He was taken up into heaven.

Acts 1-2

Immediately before Jesus was taken up into heaven, He told His disciples to stay in Jerusalem until they were baptized of the Holy Spirit, which took place about 10 days later.  Jesus told them that the purpose of that baptism was to give them power, so that they might be effect witnesses for Him throughout the whole world.  The Apostles watched Jesus being taken up into the clouds, and the angel told them that it would be in a like manner that He will return, where people will see Him coming from the sky.  While they were waiting for the Holy Spirit’s baptism in Jerusalem, the apostles chose Matthias to be the 12th apostle, in place of Judas, who had given up his office in betraying Jesus.

On the day of Pentecost, which was a feast of the Jews which takes place 50 days following the Feast of First Fruits (when Jesus was raised from the dead), the Holy Spirit fell in power upon the disciples who were gathered together in Jerusalem, just as the Lord has promised.  Under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, they began to speak in languages they didn’t otherwise know, and foreigners in Jerusalem for Pentecost heard their own native languages being spoken, and many believed after Peter stood up and preached about Jesus, and all that they were witnessing.  On that day some 3,000 people were saved, and it really marked the birth date of Christ’s church.

Acts 3-5

After these things Peter and John are going to the temple to pray, and they encounter a man begging at the gate, who had been lame for 40 years.  Peter tells him to get up and walk in the Name of Jesus, and he is made whole in that moment.  This causes an uproar among the people, and the temple rulers have Peter and John arrested, but they later let them go because of the crowd.  Many believed, and the church swelled to around 5,000.  There was great unity among the believers, and many who had property and money gave to help those who were in need.

However, there was a man and his wife, Ananias and Sapphira, who saw that Barnabas had sold a piece of property, and gave the proceeds to the church, and they wanted to be recognized for doing the same thing.  Unfortunately, they lied about the proceeds, and they kept back some of what they had received in selling the property.  They ended up dying because they lied about what they had done before God.  They were under no obligation to give anything, and they had the freedom to keep whatever they wanted from the sale of the property, but they suffered the judgement of God because they lied about what they had given.

A revival was going on, with many people being saved and healed, and the temple rulers were jealous and angry over what was going on, and again arrested the apostles, but at the night they were released from prison by an angel, and they went back and continued preaching to the people.  When they were taken again before the Jewish Council, Rabbi Gamaliel gave wise counsel to let them go, and not (essentially) go to war with God.

Acts 6-8:1

The apostles were being pulled in many different directions, because of how large the church was growing, and they called upon the church to select some men to be servants in the church, which we typically refer to as deacons today (table servant is the meaning of this word, like a waiter).  Among the seven men chosen was Stephen, who ended up also being a great witness for Christ, and many miracles were performed through him.  The Jews were jealous of all that was happening, and men came forward and lied about the things Stephen was teaching, indicating that he was denying the law of Moses.

Stephen was called before the Counsel, and given the opportunity to testify in his own defense.  In that he proceeds to give a lengthy history of the nation of Israel, indicating how much he knew about the law and their history.  He tells them time after time how often the leaders in Israel had failed to obey God, and then at the end how they had conspired to crucify the Son of God, Who was sent to them from God.  This was the last straw for the Counsel, and they rose up and proceeded to have Stephan stoned to death, and he became the first martyr for the Name of Jesus.  Saul of Tarsus, who would later become the apostle Paul, was present at Stephen’s stoning.

Acts 8:2-9:43

Following the stoning of Stephen, Saul becomes a crazy man in persecuting Christians, with many being hauled from their homes and taken to prison.

Much of Acts 8 focuses on some of the things that Philip did.  This is Philip the Deacon, not one of the 12 apostles.  He first preached Christ in Samaria, where many were saved, but they did not receive the baptism of the Holy Spirit until Peter and John went there from Jerusalem, and laid hands on them in prayer.  Philip is then led by the Spirit to go to the far southwest corner of Israel, which is closest to Egypt, in Gaza.  He encounters an Ethiopian court officer, who is reading from Isaiah 53, but who doesn’t understand what he is reading.  Philip explains the scriptures, leads him to salvation, and then baptizes him in water alongside the road.  After this baptism, Philip is translated to a city 20-30 miles north, and then preaches in every city on his way to Galilee, where he will stop in Caesarea.  It is likely that he planted the churches in Joppa and Lydda, which we will see already in existence in Act 9, as he traveled from Azotus (Ashdod) to Caesarea.

In Acts 9 Saul had been given a commission by the Sanhedrin to go and arrest Christians, and he is heading north towards the city of Damascus (in Syria) when He meets up with Jesus, and is struck blind.  He is told to go to Damascus, and stay until he is given further instructions from God.  The Lord appears to another disciple named Ananias, and tells him to go and pray for Saul in Damascus, and his sight is restored, and he immediately begins preaching to all that will hear, that Jesus is the Son of God.  As will be the case for the rest of his life, he makes the Jews there angry, and they plot to kill him, but he escapes to Jerusalem, and Barnabas introduces him to the rest of the disciples.

Meanwhile, Peter goes down to Lydda and Joppa, where his prayer heals a paralyzed man, and Tabitha (Dorcus) is raised from the dead, and many more people believed in Jesus, and were saved.

Acts 10-11

A godly Roman Centurion in the city of Caesarea is told by an angel to send for Peter, in Joppa, so that he might hear the gospel preached.  While this is going on, Peter has a vision of many unclean animals, where God tells him to kill and eat, indicating that nothing is unclean that He has declared as clean.  Peter doesn’t understand the vision until he goes to Caesarea, and enters the house of the Centurion, who is a Gentile.  Peter comes to realize that the message of the gospel is being equally made available to both Jews and Gentiles, and God confirms this by saving those Peter preached to in the Centurion’s house, and then baptizing the people there in the Holy Spirit, even before they were baptized in water.  When Peter returns to Jerusalem, he is confronted by Christian Jews, who had heard that he had been preaching among the Gentiles.  Peter explains to them all that God had shown him, and the disciples and apostles in Jerusalem came to the same realization, that salvation by faith in Jesus Christ was now available to both Jews and Gentiles alike.

Some disciples went out from Jerusalem because of the persecution towards Christians (following the stoning of Stephen), and started preaching to Gentiles in the city of Antioch.  When the apostles heard about this in Jerusalem, Barnabas was sent to help out, and there were many saved in that city, and it was there the believers were first called “Christians”.  Barnabas traveled to the nearby city of Tarsus, and found Saul, and brought him back to Antioch, where they preached Jesus for an entire year before traveling together back to Jerusalem.

Acts 12-13

In Acts 12 there are many who are arrested and persecuted by Herod, who found that this was pleasing to the Jewish rulers, and it was at this time that he had James the Apostle, the brother of John put to death.  Peter is also arrested, however an angel of the Lord frees him from his chains, and leads him out the prison, without any of the guards seeing them.  Following his escape, Peter leaves that region in Galilee, and it is a short time later that Herod is struck down by God, and he dies.

Chapter 13 marks a transition in the story of this book, when Paul and Barnabas are commissioned by the elders in Antioch to go out and preach the gospel.  This is the beginning of what we call Paul’s first missionary journey, and after he and Barnabas are rejected by the Jewish rulers of the synagogue in Pisidian Antioch (a different Antioch), Paul tells them that they are going to preach the gospel of Jesus to the Gentiles.  There will be many times that Paul first tries to preach to the Jews in various cities, but he ends up going to the Gentiles when his own people reject him, and thus he is known as the Apostle to the Gentiles, just as Jesus had predicted when He called Saul on the road to Damascus.