Easter Sunday, 2008

Fire & Reign – Studies in the Book of Acts – Lesson 1

Embracing The Mission

Of The Risen Christ

Acts 1:1-11

Last Sunday evening, a group of guys from Gateway got together to watch the premier of a new HBO series John Adams, based on the Pulitzer Prize winning biography by David McCullough.  Adams was a wonderful patriot, with deep personal values, a strong marriage to an incredible woman, and a vibrant Christian faith.  He was instrumental in George Washington being named the leader of the Continental army, and in selecting Thomas Jefferson to write the Declaration of Independence.  He needed Jefferson, who was on the other side of the political spectrum to write the declaration, because he tended to alienate people with his strong arguments and harsh temper.  But he was a brilliant mind, and had an amazing impact on our Nation that lasts to this day.

Let me read to you, very briefly, the climax of the book.  It’s found near the end. Oh yes, here it is: “John Adams was dead...”  That’s right, I just ruined the movie for everyone!  He dies at the end of his life!

When you think about it, that’s the way all biographies end.  Read a book about Adams, Washington, or Reagan it’s the same.  Or the biographies of great biblical characters like Moses, Joshua, David, or Solomon, and you will find that their stories all end with an epitaph like “He slept with his fathers.”  They died, just like their fathers before them.  Just like our fathers before us, and just as we all shall.  The difference with them –Joshua, David, John Adams and the rest – is that they lived such lives that their legacy and their impact remains important and worthy of note even after they have died.

When Moses died, his impact lived on through the Law of God that he had recorded, but his body was buried.  When David died, his legacy was maintained by the Psalms he wrote, but the heart that sought after God’s own would beat no more.  More contemporarily, when Martin Luther King, Jr. died, his influence was seen in the Civil Rights legislation and cultural change that followed, but his gifted tongue was never heard from again.  In each case, and in the case of people through history like them, the measure of their life’s impact is primarily reliant upon the memory of them – their legacy – because they, themselves, are gone.

Their lives inspire us to embrace what we know is right even if it means suffering great loss.  They motivate us to endure through hardships and personal loss for the greater good.  They stir us to greater faith as we see God direct their lives through seemingly overwhelming circumstances. 

Carl Sandburg wrote of Abraham Lincoln, “The full height of the tallest oak is not known until it has fallen and can be accurately measured.” Oftentimes, for historical figures, it seems that they take on greater influence after their death than they may have had previously, especially for those whose death is sudden or tragic.  They become a martyr for their cause, for their principles, and people are motivated by their life, their death and their memory.

Of course, there’s one biography that is set apart from all others - that of Jesus of Nazareth.  We have four different biographies of Jesus, each reliably written within a generation of his life by eyewitnesses and with eyewitness testimony.  Each of those four source biographies, and all collaborative materials since then, point to a life that is unlike any other. 

Watch this video clip.  [Clip from The Passion of the Christ – stone rolling away, empty grave clothes, Jesus alive, standing and walking forward.] 

Unlike the biographies of every other person to have walked the earth, death was not the end for Jesus.  He left that tomb greater and stronger than He was before.  Unlike the others we mentioned before, it was not simply the memory of Jesus, or the recalling of His stirring speeches that motivated people – Jesus had risen from the dead, and was in fact stronger and greater in every way after His death than before.  Paul tells us in Philippians chapter 2 that following Jesus’ obedience to death, even death on the cross that,

God exalted Him to the highest place,

and gave Him the name that is above every name,

that at the name of “Jesus” every knee should bow,

in heaven and on earth and under the earth,

and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord,

to the glory of God the Father. (Philippians 2:9-11)

The dramatic change in Jesus is demonstrated in the opening verses of the book of Revelation, when John, “the disciple that Jesus loved,” records for us his encounter with the Risen and Exalted Jesus.

…among the lamp stands was someone “like the son of man,” dressed in a robe reaching down to his feet and with a golden sash around His chest.  His head and hair were like wool, as white as snow, and his eyes were like blazing fire.  His feet were like bronze glowing in a furnace, and His voice was like the sound of rushing waters.  In His right hand he held seven stars, and out of his mouth came a sharp double edged sword.  His face was like the sun shining in all its brilliance.

(Revelation 1:12-15)

When Jesus spoke to John, He said,

I am the First and the Last, I am the Living One, I was dead, and behold I am alive forever and ever!  I hold the keys of death and the grave.

One Biblical scholar wrote,

This is not the humble son of a carpenter, nor the battered victim of crucifixion.  No, this is the resurrected, triumphant, magnificent Son of God in all His glory!  John’s descriptions of Jesus all speak of power, purity and majesty…[i]

Jesus Himself proclaimed this truth to His disciples when He appeared to them after the resurrection.  In Matthew 28:18, Jesus said,     “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.”

Listen.  It wasn’t the memory of Jesus that was greater in the minds of His followers – it was the person of Jesus who was exalted, and remains exalted to this day! 

It was with those words fresh in their ears that Jesus then issued his commissioning to those disciples.  The very next words from Jesus were,

Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you.

Beginning today, we are going to spend our Sunday mornings looking at how those disciples fulfilled that mission.  We’re going to spend the coming weeks studying the book of Acts, which is included in our Bibles by God to provide for us a historical record and a spiritual guideline for continuing that mission today. 

Luke, a physician who had originally written the biography of Jesus that bears his name, wrote the Acts of the Apostles.  But because Jesus biography does not end with His death, Luke was compelled to continue to tell His story in a second book.  The first verse of Acts chapter 1 really sets the tone.  Luke writes,

In my former book, Theophilus, I wrote about all that Jesus began to do and teach until he day He was taken up to heaven, after giving instructions through the Holy Spirit to the apostles he had chosen.  After His suffering, He showed Himself to these men and gave many convincing proofs that He was alive.  He appeared to them over a period of 40 days and spoke about the kingdom of God.

The death of Jesus was not the end!  In fact, Luke starts off by saying that the gospel of Jesus was just the beginning of all He did!  His suffering and His death were followed by 40 days of instruction, culminating, as we have seen from Matthew’s gospel, with the commissioning.  Luke records it in verse 8:

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 this,” Luke continues, “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.

You know, when I read that last paragraph, I think of the church today.  Far too often, we’re doing just what the disciples were doing – “standing there, looking into the sky.”

This week I heard Archbishop Timothy Dolan on the radio talking about Easter, and he was talking about how many people go to church at Easter and maybe Christmas, and that’s about it.  They have this idea that, “Well, I went to church.  I ‘looked up into heaven,’ and I believe that Jesus is up there, so I’m done!”

But there’s so much more!  Jesus had left specific instructions for those disciples, and He expected them to follow those instructions!  He sent those angels to go an “nudge” them along. 

He expects us to follow those instructions, too.

“Men of Galilee, why do you stand here looking into the sky?”

People of Gateway, why do you stand here looking into the sky?”

In the coming weeks, we are going to see the amazing way that these unschooled ruffians, who made up such a dysfunctional, disjointed, completive group were transformed into a powerful force for change that literally turned the world upside down.  Along the way, we’re going to trust God to transform us, too.  I invite you to join us.

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[Hold up John Adams book.]   Some might say, “Oh! To have John Adams around today!  A man of character, courage intelligence, and sacrifice in our country today!  When you think about it, how much can John Adams help us now?  Sure his example of character and integrity are inspiring – but he himself is powerless to help us in our situation as a nation or as individuals.  He’s dead!

But we serve a risen, living Christ!  The same Jesus Who inspired, commissioned and empowered the apostles in Acts chapter 1, calls us today to the same mission.  He fills us with the same Holy Spirit, and He compels us to be His witnesses in Mayville, and in all Wisconsin, and to ends of the earth.  The story didn’t end with the cross!  The story didn’t end with the grave!  The story didn’t even end with the resurrection!  And the story does not end with this Easter service!  Jesus has “just begun” to do His work, let’s embrace the mission of the Risen Christ, and be part of the continuing impact of the living King of Kings and Lord of Lords!