Well, good morning, friends. This morning we're starting a new sermon series in the book of Acts.
! So would you turn with me to Acts chapter 1. Acts chapter 1. We're going to look at the first 14 verses of Acts chapter 1 today.
So let me pray as we come to God's Word together. Father, we thank You for this morning. God, thank You for Your Spirit
who dwells so powerfully among us, and thank You that He has given us a Word through which, God, You continue to speak.
So as we come to Your Word this morning, Father, we ask that we would see not just truths to believe or things to do,
but we pray that we would see You in all Your glory, that we would see Your Son, our Lord Jesus Christ,
in all of His beauty and grace, in all of His power and sovereignty,
and that by Your Spirit we would be formed and transformed as followers of Him. We pray this in His mighty name. Amen.
All right, Acts chapter 1. Let me read 1 through 14 for us.
Acts begins like this.
In the first book, O Theophilus, I've dealt with all that Jesus began to do and teach
until the day when He was taken up after He had given commands through the Holy Spirit to the apostles whom He had chosen.
He presented Himself alive to them after His suffering by many proofs, appearing to them during forty days and speaking about the kingdom of God.
And while staying with them, He ordered them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the promise of the Father,
which, He said, you heard from Me, for John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now.
So when they had come together, they asked Him,
Lord, will You at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?
He said to them, it is not for You to know times or seasons that the Father has fixed by His own authority,
but you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you,
and you will be My witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and to the ends of the earth.
And when He had said these things, as they were looking on, He was lifted up, and a cloud took Him out of their sight.
And while they were gazing into heaven as He went, behold, two men stood by them in white robes and said,
Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into heaven?
This Jesus who was taken up from you into heaven will come in the same way as you saw Him go into heaven.
Then they returned to Jerusalem from the mount called Olivet, which is near Jerusalem, a Sabbath day's journey away.
And when they had entered, they went up to the upper room where they were staying,
Peter and John and James and Andrew, Philip and Thomas, Bartholomew and Matthew,
James the son of Alphaeus, and Simon the zealot, and Judas the son of James.
All these, with one accord, were devoting themselves to prayer,
together with the women and Mary, the mother of Jesus, and His brothers.
Where are we going?
Are we there yet?
Are you sure we don't need to pull over and ask for directions?
These are some typical questions you might hear on a family car ride.
Of course, no one really asks for directions anymore, right?
Because now we have GPSs on all of our phones.
Now, of course, in the confines of a minivan, such questions can become a bit irksome.
But on the whole, they are good questions.
And not just when you're packed into the car for a weekend road trip.
Where are we going?
It's a good question to ask of one's life, is it not?
And here we are this morning on the brink of a new season, right?
For some of us, it's the start of a fresh semester at school.
For others, you've moved to New Haven for the start of a new job.
For others, you've welcomed the addition of a new family member.
Perhaps you've just arrived to New Haven from another part of the country or another part of the world.
Or perhaps you've been around for some time and are just feeling the air of newness as well.
And in this season, it's right to be asking, where am I going?
What am I going to be about?
What direction will I take?
And of course, it's not just a new season for many of us individually,
but also for us as a church, it's the start of a new season.
As another school year begins, it's another ministry year for us that's beginning.
And so, for us now, it's right to be asking, where are we going?
What are we going to be about?
So, both individually and corporately, there's a great opportunity before us.
An opportunity to set our sights afresh on what God will have us be and do.
An opportunity to kind of get down to the essentials, to sort of clear the barnacles off the hull
and to open up the sails and to hit the open water with fresh vigor and purpose and direction.
You see, in any congregation and in any Christian's life, really, there's a danger of kind of falling into what we might call maintenance mode, right?
Of settling into a kind of comfortable status quo.
But what we see in the book of Acts is the church on a mission.
A church that's not comfortable or complacent, but on the move.
But, of course, the shift from kind of maintenance to mission is not easy, right?
Often, we don't like change.
We don't like to step out of our comfort zone.
But, in addition, it can be a little dangerous.
We can rush forward without the proper kind of biblical moorings and priorities.
We can go forth with a frenetic urgency and passion and then quickly lose heat and lose heart.
There will be a lot of talk, a lot of running around, a lot of activity, but no real lasting fruit.
We can launch our ship from the harbor with excitement, with enthusiasm.
But if the compass is off just a few degrees, we'll find ourselves eventually lost at sea.
Discouraged.
Frustrated.
Thirsty.
But if we come again to the Bible and listen to what God is telling us about our identity to God.
So, what do we learn then?
What do we learn about our mission as a church, this mission of the King, from this passage?
Well, I want to point out four things this morning that we learn about our mission from this passage.
The first thing we see is what we might call the nature of our mission.
What is the nature of our mission?
Well, Jesus says in verse 8, you'll be my witnesses, right?
Now, words like witness or testimony, they can often have sort of a religious ring to them these days, right?
We often talk about someone giving their testimony in a church service.
But instead, picture yourself when you hear this word in a courtroom.
Someone's on trial.
And you're called to the stand because you've seen, heard, or experienced something that's relevant to the case.
In other words, you're a witness and you're being asked to give your testimony.
These words have that same kind of courtroom connotation here in Acts.
The apostles have seen and heard and experienced something.
And Jesus is telling them that now they're going to share it, to state it, to testify to it.
And that's the first reason why, if we think about it, the first reason why the nature of the church's mission is witness.
The first reason why is because Christianity is, first and foremost, about what Jesus Christ has done in history.
What he's done objectively, such that people could see him with their eyes and hear him with their ears and even touch him with their hands.
It wasn't just a subjective kind of religious experience that they had.
Luke kind of goes out of his way, doesn't he, to make this clear in our passage.
In verse 3 he says,
There is, friends, a kind of facticity to the Christian message of Jesus.
And that's why the nature of our mission is one of witness.
Because at its root, it's built upon something that men and women had seen and heard and touched and experienced.
And what that means is that Christianity offers itself for genuine investigation.
Christianity doesn't ask you to sort of suspend your reason when considering Christ.
In fact, just the opposite.
It invites you to come to the Gospels with all your mental faculty sharpened and to ask the tough questions.
Friend, don't think that Christianity is threatened by questions.
In fact, it welcomes them.
So if we are being true to the nature of our mission, to testify, to witness, to the Christ who acted in history,
then our church should be a place where more and more people are asking some genuine questions and seeking honest answers.
But, you know, there's a second reason why the nature of our mission is witness.
It's witness.
It's this.
The reason why the nature of our mission is witness is because Christianity is not primarily something that we do,
but something Christ has done for us.
Therefore, witness testifying to something outside of us has to be the essential nature of this mission.
Think about it.
If Christianity were basically a list, right, of rules that we had to keep,
then Christ would have said to the apostles,
okay, you're going to be my police officers to keep people in line, right?
Or I'm sending you out as judges to evaluate how people are doing.
But instead, Jesus says, you're going to be my witnesses
because I, Jesus, have accomplished all that's necessary to reconcile sinners to God.
So we testify to what Jesus has done at its core.
And what does that mean?
If we're witnessing to something that Christ has done,
not something that we have to perform or upkeep.
Well, friends, it means that our mission needs to be marked.
It must be marked.
It will be marked by genuine humility.
Now, not the kind of humility that's sort of never certain whether anything is true or not, right?
That's not the kind of humility we're talking about.
Rather, we're talking about the kind of humility that realizes
our own ability and ambitions are not what matter at the end of the day.
This is the kind of humility that realizes we have nothing in ourselves to boast about.
This is the kind of humility that sort of forgets itself
and focuses on the greatness of Christ.
So, this is the first thing we see,
that the nature of our mission as a church is witness.
It's testifying to Christ.
Second, let's consider the scope of this mission that we have,
the scope of our mission.
In verse 8, Jesus says to the apostles,
you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem,
in all Judea and Samaria,
and to the ends of the earth.
In short, what we see here is that the scope
of the mission of Jesus for His church is worldwide.
Now, consider just a moment what this verse is telling us about God.
In short, it's telling us that God is faithful to His promises, actually,
if you were to hear this sort of commission of Jesus
in light of the Old Testament, right?
God is faithful to His promises.
You know, one way to think about Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria here
is that that was the kind of old geographic extent of ancient Israel.
Throughout the Old Testament, God said that He would bring His salvation
to His people, to His Old Testament people, to Israel.
And now Jesus is saying to the apostles,
you're going to be the witness bearers of salvation
to the Jewish people.
You're going to be my witnesses to them.
But, you see, it goes further than that.
Just like the Old Testament pushed further than that.
Because God's salvation wasn't just for ethnic Israel.
It was a salvation that God had planned
through Israel for everyone
to the ends of the earth.
Even sometimes when it made us a little uncomfortable,
made the apostles a little uncomfortable.
In the first century, you'll remember that Samaria
was sort of that region sort of north of Jerusalem and Judea.
It was a place where people who were kind of multi-ethnic lived.
They were half Jewish, half Gentile.
Their religious beliefs were sort of an amalgam
of some Old Testament beliefs,
but some beliefs imported in from other cultures.
And because of that,
Samaritans were despised by many Jews of Jesus' day.
But the gospel was for them too.
And then it pushes even further out.
The ends of the earth, Jesus says.
Right?
To the ends of the earth,
which is inclusive of all ethnicities,
and all cultures,
and all language groups.
And again, in the Old Testament,
God had promised that through the Messiah,
He would bring His salvation to all people,
to the ends of the earth.
That the Messiah, when He came,
wouldn't just be Israel's King,
but He would be the world's true Lord.
That He would bring God's kingdom,
that is God's saving rule,
God's world-healing reign,
and then across the globe,
to the ends of the earth,
even all the way to the ends of the earth,
right here in New Haven.
Have you considered, friends,
from the perspective of Jerusalem,
we are like in the far-flung reaches
of nowheresville,
right here in New Haven, right?
And yet, lo and behold,
God's faithful to His promise.
Here we are,
hearing the message of His salvation.
Now, incidentally,
this verse here that we're looking at,
it kind of provides a rough outline
of the book of Acts,
if you think about it.
In the book of Acts,
what we're going to see
is that chapters 1 through 7
deal with the apostles' witness
in Jerusalem.
And then in 8 through 12,
we consider Judea and Samaria.
And then in chapters 13 through 28,
we see the gospel beginning
to go to the ends of the earth.
Or at least it makes it
all the way to Rome,
which was the center
of the empire at the time.
Now, this scope of the mission
that we see here,
what does it tell us?
It tells us about the universality
of the gospel, right?
The Christian message is good news
for everyone.
No matter what country
or culture you're from,
the message about Jesus
is the message that
you desperately need
and that God graciously offers.
Now, of course,
that's the thing
that kind of trips many of us up
when they consider Christianity, right?
How could you say
that Christianity is the truth
for everybody?
Sounds a little exclusive
or intolerant, right?
There can't just be one answer
for everyone, right?
We think that.
And yet, friends, what if?
What if as humans,
there were one problem
that we all shared?
One problem that we all experienced
and acknowledged
and spent our whole lives
living under,
many of us spend our whole lives
ignoring, right?
What if there was one problem
we all experienced
and what if there were
one person
who actually overcame
that problem?
What if there was someone
who actually defeated
that problem for good?
wouldn't you want to share
the news about that person
with everyone?
Wouldn't you want to commend
that person to everyone you know?
I mean, think about it.
You listen to a podcast,
it gives you some, like,
hot takes on how to improve
your sleep,
and you're like,
you've got to hear this, right?
But, friends,
there is someone who has come
who has solved
the problem of human existence.
Because, listen,
each of us
is going to die one day.
It is the universal problem,
and there's only one person
who's ever overcome death,
the Lord Jesus Christ.
He rose from the dead
never to die again.
Why?
Because in His death
and resurrection,
He defeated
the cause of death,
which is sin,
the very thing
that separates us from God,
the life giver
of all things,
and separated from God
through our own waywardness
and idolatry,
we die.
And yet, Jesus has overcome that
and risen from the dead.
He has conquered death.
No other great world leader
or religious figure
can make such a claim.
Right?
If Christ has risen,
then surely all people
should know about Him,
should they not?
Both here in our Jerusalem
and Judea and Samaria,
as we might say,
and to the ends of the earth.
The scope of this mission
shows us not just
God's lordship
over all cultures
and people groups,
but the scope of this mission
tells us about God's love
for all cultures
and all people groups.
All the earth is His.
God doesn't play favorites.
His grace extends to everyone
who will receive it,
no matter what their background
or language or ethnicity.
All are welcome to come to Christ
and receive the newness of life
that He offers.
Now let me say just a quick word
of application
before moving on to the third point.
First,
Trinity,
our church,
we want to be a church
that continues
to invest
in the global mission
of the church.
The work of God
in the world
is so much bigger
than what's happening
here in New Haven.
So friends,
take some time
to learn about
the missionaries
that we support.
Pray for them
in your quiet time
in your small group.
But second,
we need to continually
remind ourselves
of how strategically
we are placed
as a church
to impact
the worldwide mission
of the church.
People come to New Haven
from all around the world.
Some people come to New Haven
even from countries
where Christianity
is illegal,
where Christians
are persecuted,
and where most people
have little or no exposure
to Christ,
and God providentially
brings them here
right into our backyard,
as it were,
right into our apartment complexes
and our residence halls.
And all this means,
what it means
is that you and I
here
can reach the ends
of the earth
with the gospel
without having to walk
to the end of our street.
Right?
Let me be somewhat direct.
Do not think
that God brought you
to New Haven
simply so you can
get an education,
or work for a few years,
and then move on.
God brought you
to New Haven
to be a part
of His kingdom work.
So whether you're
going to be here
for four months
and move on,
or four years
and move on,
or whether you're
going to be here
for the rest of your life,
join a church,
get in on the action,
and don't miss out.
The scope of this mission
is worldwide,
and the world's right here,
right at our doorstep,
ready to hear the good news.
So that's the scope
of the mission.
Third, we see in this passage
not just the nature
and the scope of the mission,
we see the power,
the power of mission.
Now at this point
you might be thinking,
how in the world
can I,
can we,
possibly do this?
Right?
The first obvious problem,
given the nature
of our mission as witnesses,
is that we aren't
eyewitnesses of Christ,
right?
The apostles,
whom Jesus chose,
are fundamentally different
than anyone else
who came after them
because they were
literal eyewitnesses
of Jesus Christ,
of His ministry,
of His death,
of His resurrection,
and of His ascension.
We aren't witnesses
in the same way
the apostles were witnesses.
In what sense then
can we be witnesses at all?
Right?
And second,
given the immensity
of the scope
of the mission
to the ends of the earth,
how can we possibly
even make a dent in that?
It seems overwhelming.
Well friends,
the answer,
actually,
to both of those problems
is found in verses 4 and 5
and in the first half
of verse 8.
In a few days,
Jesus told His disciples,
you will be baptized
in the Holy Spirit.
And in verse 8,
He says,
you'll receive power
when the Holy Spirit
comes upon you.
The Holy Spirit,
God Himself,
the third person
of the Trinity,
the Lord,
the giver of life,
as the Creed says,
the Holy Spirit
is the power
of our mission.
Now, we're not going
to go into all
of the detail we could
concerning the Holy Spirit
this morning
because His ministry
is going to unfold
as we walk through Acts
this year.
And if you want
to go even deeper,
you can come to the
adult ed class
starting next week
at 9 o'clock.
We're going to explore
the person and work
of the Holy Spirit
in more depth.
But for now,
here's the relevant point
that Jesus is pulling out
in the context of mission.
Jesus is promising
that the Holy Spirit
will come upon
His disciples
in abundance
and they will be
empowered by the Spirit
to carry out
this mission.
Think about that word
baptize, right?
Baptize means
to immerse something,
to plunge something
underwater.
And Jesus promises them
that in a few days
they're going to be
plunged into the Spirit's
presence and power.
Just like the prophets,
like Joel and Isaiah
and Ezekiel had promised,
just like John the Baptist
had promised,
the Holy Spirit
was going to flood
their lives,
as it were.
Now, of course,
again,
these earliest disciples,
especially the apostles,
they occupied
a unique place, right,
in the history of redemption.
They had a unique place.
I mean,
one of the ways
in which they were unique,
right,
is that they were followers
of Jesus
before Jesus had completed
His redemptive work
and before He inaugurated
the New Covenant.
So they sort of received
the Holy Spirit
in New Covenant fullness
after they had already
become disciples of Jesus,
as it were,
right?
But today,
we are in the position
living on this side
of Pentecost
that we are baptized
with the Spirit,
we are flooded
with His presence
upon our conversion
to Christ,
upon receiving Him.
Now,
we can experience
fillings with the Spirit,
no doubt,
right?
These fillings can range
in depth and duration,
but friend,
every genuine
New Testament Christian
has been baptized,
so to say,
with the Holy Spirit.
Now,
what does that mean?
Well,
it means a lot.
It means that God
Himself,
in the person
of the Holy Spirit,
is present
to believers today
in a real,
personal,
and powerful way
through the Holy Spirit.
we may not be
eyewitnesses
of Jesus' resurrection
like the apostles were,
but we have
their eyewitness testimony
preserved for us
in the New Testament,
and that Spirit-inspired
written witness
still speaks today.
And moreover,
we have the same Spirit
dwelling in us
as in them,
so today,
we may not be able
to physically experience
the risen Jesus,
but we can still
no less experience
His spiritually
transformative power
through the operation
of the Holy Spirit.
We can hold forth
the apostolic testimony
and witness
to our own experience
of the risen Lord Jesus
at work in our lives
through His Spirit.
But what are the power
Jesus promises?
It is true
that on our own,
we are too weak
to carry out
our mission,
but God has given us
exactly what we need.
Zechariah 4, 6 says,
not by might,
not by power,
but by my Spirit,
says the Lord of hosts,
right?
So the question is,
and the question
we have to ask ourselves is,
what power are we relying on
to fulfill our mission?
At the end of the day,
are we relying
on our clever intellect?
Do we think we can argue
or reason people
into the kingdom of God?
Are we depending
on our kind disposition?
Do we think that
if we're super nice to people,
we'll win them to Christ?
Are we relying
on massive programs
or flashy technology
to produce
spiritual transformation?
Friends, listen,
all that stuff
has its place.
God wants you
to use your mind.
God wants you
to use your love.
God wants you
to use the tools
at your disposal
to witness Him,
but the truth is,
none of that
is going to do
a hill of beans
without the Holy Spirit.
Without the Holy Spirit
shining the light
of the glory of Jesus
into our hearts.
Without that ministry,
the Holy Spirit,
we can argue
and we can love
and we can program
all we want
and it won't make
a difference.
But here's the good news.
Just as Jesus promised,
the Spirit's power
is at work in us.
We can rely on Him
in our speaking,
in our loving,
in our planning
to do the real work
of changing hearts
through those means.
And what does that power
look like?
You know,
when we think about
the power of the Holy Spirit
today,
we immediately tend
to think of the so-called
sort of miraculous gifts,
things like healing
or speaking in tongues
and prophecy.
And we're going to talk
about those as we go
in the book of Acts.
But can I share with you
one of, I think,
one of the key passages
about the Holy Spirit's power
in the New Testament?
It's from Ephesians chapter 3,
verses 14 through 19.
And it says this.
It's actually a prayer
of the Apostle Paul.
Paul says,
Oh, why?
For what?
So that Christ
may dwell in your hearts
through faith,
that you being rooted
and grounded in love
may have strength
to comprehend
with all the saints.
Notice the power language?
Strength to comprehend what?
What is the breadth
and length
and height
and depth
and to know
the love of Christ
that surpasses knowledge
that you may be filled
with all the fullness
of God.
When the power
of the Holy Spirit
is at work in our lives,
how do we know?
It's when Christ
dwells in our hearts.
It's when the love
of Christ
shines forth
in all of its
multi-dimensionality,
its height,
its depth,
its length,
its breadth,
when we're filled
with all that fullness
of God's grace
and love for us.
That's the Holy Spirit's
power at its core.
When instead of our hearts
being caught up
with false gods,
right?
When instead of that,
Christ dwells there.
When instead of seeing
the love of Christ
as a small thing,
we gape and we gasp
and our intellect
reaches its limit
because of the immensity
of Christ's love for us.
We know something
that surpasses knowledge.
In short,
the Spirit
is powerfully at work,
not just when there are
signs and wonders,
but when our hearts
are filled with the assurance
of the love of Jesus
in the gospel.
When we know
that Jesus has forgiven
our sins
and reconciled us to God,
when the reality of that
washes over us,
then we will speak
and we will serve
with extraordinary boldness,
just like the early church.
Friends,
that is the power
of our mission.
The power of our mission
is the Holy Spirit.
All right,
fourth,
finally,
last point.
What is the end?
What's the end
of our mission?
Well,
the end of our passage,
well,
the end of the passage
about the ascension
shows us
that there is
a hope
to our mission.
We're going somewhere.
We're headed
in a direction.
There's actually
an end,
a goal
of our journey.
And that end,
that goal,
is what?
It is the
kingdom-restoring,
world-renewing
return of Jesus Christ.
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.
Now,
of course,
we don't know
when Christ will return
to restore all things,
and there's no use
speculating about the end,
right?
Jesus tells us
the Father has set
the time by His own
authority,
and it's not for us
to know.
It's funny how often
in the history of the church
we've sort of ignored
that very clear
command of Jesus,
right?
But we know
that Christ
will return,
and when He does,
He will restore
and renew
all things.
Brothers and sisters,
here's how our story ends.
Here's how the story
of Trinity Baptist Church
ends.
Here's how the story
of your life ends
if you're a believer
in Jesus.
God wins.
The church prevails.
And of course,
it doesn't look
often
like that's going
to be the case.
The world's full,
right,
of injustice
and unbelief.
The church faces
persecution from without,
dissension from within.
At times,
we are tempted,
just like the apostles
who witnessed
Jesus' ascension,
to just kind of
stand here
gazing into the sky.
Do you wonder
what must have been
going through their minds
that day
when Jesus ascended
to the Father's presence?
Certainly one part
amazement,
to be sure.
Wonder?
Awe?
But I wonder
if it was another part
confusion.
In fear
and maybe doubt.
Because what the ascension
meant was that Christ
was returning
to the Father
definitively.
That the 40 days
of His appearing
to them,
teaching them,
being with them
after the resurrection
was coming to a close,
coming to its conclusion,
its consummation
as He was going
to be enthroned
in heaven.
He was no longer
going to be present
with them physically
and that probably
scared them a little bit.
How on earth
were they going
to make it
without Him?
So they gaze
longingly
into the sky,
partially afraid
that with Jesus
gone to heaven
they would be
abandoned and alone.
But the angels
remind them
that the end
is secure.
After all,
Jesus is not
abandoning them.
Did you notice
in the first verse
of this passage
that we read,
the first verse
of Acts,
Luke sort of starts
this book
which is the second part,
right,
of a two-part work
that Luke wrote.
The first one
we call the Gospel of Luke
or better,
the Gospel according to Luke
and then he wrote
the book of Acts.
And Luke says,
kind of picking up
his second volume,
he sort of looks back
at his first volume,
the Gospel of Luke
and says,
well, my first volume
I wrote about all
that Jesus began
to do and teach.
And what's the implication?
That this second volume
is going to be about
all that Jesus
continued to do
and teach.
You see,
the ascension of Jesus
to the Father's right hand
means that He is enthroned
as the King
of the whole creation.
And the ascended King Jesus
has poured out
His Spirit on the church
so that His work
might continue
through them.
And moreover,
Jesus Himself,
this same Jesus,
will return
to bring all things
to their conclusion.
So no matter
what the present holds,
we know how the story ends.
There's no need
to sort of wistfully
gaze at the sky
longing for the good old days,
right?
Or despairing
at our perceived weakness
and in abilities.
Friends,
Christ is on the throne
at the Father's right hand
when it says,
a cloud took Him up.
What are clouds
in Scripture, right?
He wasn't talking
about a collection
of moisture in the sky,
right?
Clouds in Scripture
are manifestations
of the presence
of God's glory.
Like the cloud
that followed the people
through the wilderness,
like the cloud
that came down
in the temple,
like the cloud
that was there
when Jesus was transfigured
on the mountain.
Jesus,
when He ascends
visibly before His apostles,
is taken up
into the glory of God
to take His place
as the King of all.
Christ is on the throne
at the Father's right hand.
His Spirit has been
poured out on us.
And He's going to return
in glory to draw
all things together
when He returns.
Sure, along the way,
we will face setbacks
and discouragements
and disappointments.
There will be times
when it seems like
the mission feels
a little futile,
but remember,
the end of the mission
is not dependent on us.
Just as God's grace
sets our mission
in motion at the beginning
and keeps it burning
with the light of the Spirit,
so God's grace
will bring it to completion
when Christ returns.
So friends,
with that hope
before our eyes
and God's Spirit
in our hearts,
don't you see
this mission that we're on?
It cannot fail.
Let's pray.
Father, we ask
that by Your Spirit
that You would renew
our minds
and our hearts
with Your grace
so that we might receive
fresh boldness
and wisdom
to faithfully witness
to Jesus,
our resurrected
and ascended King.
Jesus, we praise You.
Thank You for Your ministry.
It certainly didn't stop
when You ascended
to Your rightful throne.
But Lord,
thank You
that You continue
Your work
extending Your reign
of grace and peace
through the outpouring
of Your Spirit,
through the proclamation
of Your saving work
in the Gospel.
Father,
we pray that as we study
Acts this year
that You would shape
our minds
and our hearts,
that You would capture
our wills
and fire our imaginations
to live
as Your people,
people of the risen King,
witnesses to Your kingdom
and grace.
Pray this in Your mighty name,
Jesus.
Amen.