Acts Chapter 1:1-6

That's interesting. You know, you can tell people there's millions of stars in the galaxy and planets they've never seen and they believe you. Talk about Napoleon and Waterloo and they believe you.

You can talk about Julius Caesar and Brutus. People believe you. Start talking about Jesus being resurrected and all of a sudden people start backing up. Do you understand there's more literary, historic, archaeological proof that Jesus Christ was born, lived, died, and was resurrected than the fact that Julius Caesar ever lived? Or George Washington ever crossed the Delaware River? But when's the last time you said, I don't believe that stuff about George Washington crossing the Delaware River.

I think that's folk tale, fairy tale. Welcome to Cross the Bridge with David McGee. David is the senior pastor of the Bridge in Kernersville, North Carolina. Today we're so blessed to have with us on the program one of David McGee's associate pastors, D.A.

Brown. Welcome, brother. Hey, Bob. I'm excited to be here. I'm excited about these teachings in the Book of Acts. Man, the study through the Book of Acts is going to be awesome. I hope everyone can consistently tune in.

It's going to be great. Today we're going to jump right off by asking ourselves, how should we get information about the Holy Spirit? So many people have something to say about the Holy Spirit.

Where should we really look to to gather that information, Bob? And let's get started with David McGee with his teaching from Acts chapter 1, Talk About the Lord. Now, we're starting a new book, new chapter, the Book of Acts.

And it's so cool because, you know, yesterday I was back there studying, and then I journeyed out of my office, you know. And it was like, wow, it's happening here, the Book of Acts all over again. See, it's kind of interesting because the Book of Acts never really ends. It doesn't really, there's not a final, and then that was it. But why?

Because it's still going on. Acts chapter 1, verse 1, the former account I made, O Theophilus, of all that Jesus began both to do and teach. There we have a lot of what the book is about. It says, of all that Jesus began both to do and to teach.

And notice the priorities there. It says Jesus did the stuff. He didn't just teach it.

He did it and he taught it. And, you know, we need to remember that because so many times we're trying to tell somebody about Jesus, but they're looking for us to do something like Jesus. And a lot of times they see the disparity between what we say and what we do, and they go, well, I don't believe you because I don't see the goods. So we need to be careful that as we are telling somebody that we're living it out, that we're walking it out. Now, does that mean you've got to live a perfect life in front of everybody you're talking to about Jesus? Yes, it does.

No, I'm just kidding. It doesn't mean that, but here's the thing. Even when you mess up, that can be used by God to them and in this way. Let's say you get angry at work.

People around you, they know you're a believer. They watch you lose it. Instead of going, oh, I didn't really lose it. I wasn't really yelling. It just sounded like I was yelling because the room was so quiet or whatever, you know, saying, you know what? I did. I got upset and I need to apologize because as a Christian, I want to follow Jesus.

You know, I wasn't very much like Jesus just then. And use that as an opportunity. That's an awesome thing and this is what we want to be doing here. We want to be teaching and we want to be doing. And, you know, teach, reach, reach, teach.

We talk about that a lot. Not only do we want to reach out, but, you know, I want to reach people that are here. You know, God brings people here and I want to see them walking in the fullness of what God has for them.

I want to see them awakened out of the slumber of what this world has to offer and awaken to what the Lord is trying to do in their life. Theophilus is an interesting word. Some of you may be able to guess what it is. We use the word theology, which is the study of God. That's kind of a Greek thing, theo meaning God. And then we have phyllis, or phallus, or it's from the philio. Now, if you were here the last few weeks, you may have a guess about what philio means. Philio means friend, right.

It's the love that you have for a friend. So it's either lover of God, a friend of God. We believe that this man was, you know, a high up Roman official. Some have speculated that perhaps Luke was his personal physician.

We don't know that for sure. The other theory, and this is an interesting one, is that Luke was preparing a historical document from the Gospel of Luke and the Acts of the Apostles to present to the Roman officials during the trial of Paul. And this holds a lot of water, and we'll kind of examine that as we go along. Verse two. Now, again, this book is written by Luke.

Few people dispute that. So it's kind of interesting because we find ourselves engaging in a book that's unique in a lot of ways. But one of the ways in which it's unique is it is the only book, well, it's not the only book, it's the only author in the Bible who is not Jewish. We'll go into that another time about why we believe that Luke wasn't Jewish. He was a gentile.

We would use that word. But the Gospel of Luke and the Book of Acts, and outside of a short portion of Daniel written by Nebuchadnezzar, who was not a Jewish person, we find ourselves in a gentile book. And it's kind of interesting because the book shows how the Gospel spreads out to the gentiles. Now, it mentions many infallible proofs. See, Jesus appeared to people after he was resurrected. It wasn't just some theory running around. And it's kind of interesting because we have Roman historical writings, we have Jewish historical writings, people that weren't following Jesus that recognized that Jesus was resurrected and was walking around. This is interesting to me. So there's a lot of proof for this, if you will.

That's interesting. You know, you can tell people there's millions of stars in the galaxy and planets they've never seen, and they believe you. Talk about Napoleon and Waterloo, and they believe you. You can talk about Julius Caesar and Brutus.

Talk about George Washington and the Delaware. People believe you. Start talking about Jesus being resurrected, and all of a sudden people start backing up. Do you understand there's more literary, historic, archaeological proof that Jesus Christ was born, lived, died, and was resurrected than the fact that Julius Caesar ever lived? Or George Washington ever crossed the Delaware River?

But when's the last time you said, oh, I don't believe that stuff about George Washington crossing the Delaware River? I think that's folk tale, fairy tale. What's the issue?

Tell you what the issue is. It's the human heart. See, because the moment I say, you know what? Yeah, I believe that about Jesus. What do you do with that? See, you can believe in the Milky Way, and guess what? You don't have to do anything. You can believe in George Washington. Guess what?

That's not going to personally probably affect you. But you say that you believe that Jesus is the Son of God, that he came to die for the sins of the world. Guess what? Now what do you do? Do you accept him? Do you reject him? If you accept him, guess what? You've got to start doing the things that he talked about we should be doing, we should be focusing on. The other thing that's interesting in here, what was Jesus talking about?

The last part of verse 3 tells us. He didn't come up and go, hey, what are you guys doing? We're fishing. Oh, great, let's fish.

Let's talk about fishing. That's not what he did. It said he was speaking of the things pertaining to the kingdom of God. I like that.

You know why? Because I like talking about that stuff. I like talking about the kingdom. I like talking about what God is doing in our lives and God is doing in his fellowship. And the life lesson here is we should be talking about the Lord, what the Lord has done and what the Lord is doing in our lives and in our fellowship. We should be talking about the Lord, what the Lord has done and what the Lord is doing in our lives and in our fellowship.

Why? Well, because it should consume our conversations and ignite our lives. These things should be exciting to us. A lot of times we sit around and we talk about various things and that's all good, but we need to be talking about the Lord. We need to be talking about what God is doing in our lives and encouraging one another in this. You know, asking one another, hey, what's God speaking to you right now? What are you learning right now in the Word of God?

What are you struggling with and how can I pray for you? So many of you do this so awesome because we hear tales of people, you know, come in and there's, you know, we went to one restaurant and we came in and started talking to a waitress and she said, golly, every week somebody from your church comes in here and invites us to church. Praise God. They talk about how exciting it is. It's what you do when you get excited and you find a good thing, right? And also when you talk about the Lord, it gives you the right perspective and the right outlook because you begin to realize, you begin to gaze on heaven and at Jesus rather than what's going on, your little things in your life.

They're just so distracting sometimes. We'll be right back with more from David McGee on Cross the Bridge. Right now, here's a word from Associate Pastor D.A.

Brown. Hey, we want to pray for a few cities in our listening audience right now, specifically Seneca Falls, Windsor, New York, and also Brown Summit, Burlington, Eden, and Elizabeth City, North Carolina. God, we thank you for the people tuning in right now in these cities. We pray that you would pour your Holy Spirit out on them. Lord, we pray for those who are not listening but who live in those cities.

God, I pray that they would trust in you. Lord, that they would hear your gospel and that they would say yes to Jesus. Lord, we pray that people will get plugged in Bible-teaching churches. And Lord, we pray for those in leadership positions in these cities, that you give them wisdom and discernment, and they also will look to your Bible for answers on how to lead.

Lord, please bless these cities, and may there be revival. In Jesus' name, amen. Amen.

Thank you, brother. And now, let's get back to David McGee as he continues teaching verse by verse. Verse 4. And being assembled together with them, He commanded them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the promise of the Father, which He said you have heard from Me.

Now, there's a little phrase in here I kind of like. It says, and being assembled together. Well, why is that important? Well, we see in the latter part of the gospels that they weren't together. You remember Jesus showed up, and Thomas wasn't there. And others weren't there either. They were fractured. They were scared. They were afraid. They were fearful for their lives.

They just weren't together again. And these guys had just weathered the worst storm of their spiritual life. They had seen their leader, Jesus. They'd seen Him crucified, beaten. They'd seen Him die. But now they'd seen Him resurrected. They were back together.

And this was like the reunion tour that was going to change the world as these guys got back together. We need to be together as we experience these storms of life and not bail on one another, but continue to encourage one another in the Lord. Now, it's interesting.

God is so unhuman. What I mean by that is think about this. Think, okay, you were dead. You're come back to life. Now you're meeting with the apostles. What would be the first thing you would do? I know the first thing I would do because I'm, you know, a tin torch organization and administrative stuff. I would make a list. I would have a planning meeting.

I would have an agenda with bullet points on it and a whiteboard. Okay, guys, here's what we're going to do. But what does God do? He tells them. He says, wait.

You got to love it. Don't do anything. Do nothing. Just sit. Is that what you would have done?

I know it's not what I would have done. But God's very different than us. He says, wait.

Wait. Do you recognize that the Lord's different? See, and it's been said aptly that in the garden we went from being human beings to human doings. The disciples asked Jesus a question, John 6, 28. Then they said to Him, what shall we do that we may work the works of God? And Jesus answered and said to them, this is the work of God that you believe in Him whom He sent.

This is interesting. They said, well, we got to do. Jesus says, believe. Start there. Start there. That's where it starts. And then you wait. You wait on the Lord. There's another interesting passage in Romans, and I like the way that King James phrases this.

Romans chapter 12, verse 5 says, so we, being many, are one body in Christ, everyone members one of another, having then gifts according to the grace that is given to us, whether prophesy, let us prophesy according to the proportion of faith, or ministry, let us wait on our ministering. Are He that teaches on teaching? Are He that exhorts on exhortation? He that gives, let Him do it with simplicity.

He that rules with diligence, He that shows mercy with cheerfulness. This is interesting because it goes through a list of gifts and it says, hey, if you're a giver, give. If you do this, if you're an encourager, go ahead and encourage. If you're in ministry, sit. Wait.

Don't get me wrong. I believe we all need to be doing things for the kingdom, but it needs to start from a place of rest. Years ago as we were traveling around, I found myself out at the Calvary Chapel Bible College in California, and I would teach there some on Sunday night and do music and stuff. And so we were there, and they were just doing a lot of construction around there. And I said, I kept offering to help. Hey, y'all need some help doing this?

You need some help doing that? And they kept saying, no, no. And I thought, man, you must think I can't do it.

It's the guy thing, I guess. And finally, one of the guys that was one of the leaders there says, you don't get it, do you? I said, what are you talking about? He said, we want to bless you. We just want to bless you. And God's grace wants to be extended towards you. So go study, go out and share at these different churches. But when you're here, this is a place of rest.

Thank you, Lord. So you say, why we should be doing things? We should be doing those things from the place of rest, knowing that our sins have been forgiven.

Why? Because we've asked for them to be forgiven. Verse five, Jesus continues and says, for John truly baptized with water, but you shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now. Oh, the Holy Spirit. You know, no part of the Trinity suffers from as much bad teaching as the Holy Spirit.

And here's the reason. People bring their emotions. They bring their conjectures.

They bring their experiences. They bring what they've been told by church leadership that has nothing to do with the Bible. And what we want to do this morning and throughout this book is add biblical clarity to what you know and believe about the Holy Spirit. I would dare to say there's probably not a single person in here who has not suffered under some type of bad teaching, poor teaching, or just avoiding the subject altogether of the Holy Spirit. So what we have to do is base what we believe on the Bible. It sounds simplistic, I know, but it's very important for us to do in all areas, but especially in the area of the Holy Spirit. Can we agree to do that, that we will look to the Bible alone to learn about the Holy Spirit?

Can we agree to that? We should base our beliefs about the Holy Spirit on the Bible alone, because I know. I mean, I have a television. I watch it sometimes. I have seen some of the same stuff that you've seen. I've been in churches that misrepresented God and misrepresented the Holy Spirit, and I've cringed and I've shrank back. I've been to churches that I didn't feel good about inviting anybody to because of some of the stuff that was going on. I'm not sure why I was there.

That's a good question. But see, here's the thing, guys. If you're gonna sit here this morning and go, well, you know, this whole doctrine of the Holy Spirit, I've just seen some stuff that makes me afraid. Yeah, me too. Well, there's this whole doctrine of the Holy Spirit. I've seen some people that have done some really weird things.

Yeah, me too. But guys, do you understand that some people have used those types of arguments to reject Jesus and Christianity? Because they say, well, you know, I knew a Christian once. He was kind of weird.

Yeah, I knew one or two as well. But do I reject Jesus? Do I reject salvation and that whole thing? Why? Because I met one weird person along the way?

No. And you can't do that with the Holy Spirit. You know, it's interesting because this is probably one of the things that more, it divides evangelical Christianity more than any other subject, I think. Once you figure out somebody believes, you know, that the Word's infallible and, you know, that they believe salvation through Jesus alone, invariably it moves right to the Holy Spirit. What do you believe about the Holy Spirit? What can we argue about?

How sad that is. Because we're told in Ephesians 4, 3, always keep yourselves united in the Holy Spirit and bind yourselves together with peace. So as we talk about the Holy Spirit, as we look into the Bible about the Holy Spirit, understand, we may not agree on everything.

And you know what? That's okay. We may not agree on all the particulars. But we do need to agree on what the source is for what we believe. Now, understand, even as we get, and we're gonna get more and more in details into this as the book does, but we can believe different things about the Holy Spirit and still fellowship together. Now, if you're here this morning and you don't believe that Jesus was the Son of God and you don't think Jesus is the only way to heaven and you do not believe that Jesus died for your sins, if you don't believe that yet or if you don't come to that belief after a length of time, this probably is not the church for you. I'm not saying you have to believe that this morning because I know some of you probably don't.

And you are our welcome and honored guest. But if over time you don't come to believe these things, man, we're just never gonna see eye to eye. But let's not sink down into deep, dark arguments about issues that, man, people have been disagreeing on for a long time. Verse six, Therefore when they had come together, they asked Him, saying, Lord, will You at this time restore the kingdom to Israel? The disciples. They just encourage us at every turn, don't they? I mean, here they are, after three years of intensive training, they've seen the crucifixion, they've seen the resurrection, and they're still missing it. And they ask the question, are you gonna restore Israel now?

You gonna overthrow the Roman government? Don't miss this. They had been with Jesus and spent all this time with Jesus, but even after these intensive trainings of three years, they still didn't know what Jesus was doing. That should encourage you. Because you know what? I'll be honest. I don't know what Jesus is doing sometimes.

Now it may scare you. Because you're like, I think you're a pastor, you're supposed to know what Jesus is doing all the times of the day, 24-7. I'm sorry, I don't.

I don't. I mean, He reveals some things to me and quickens my heart about stuff and stirs my heart about stuff. And a lot of times I'll step out and I'll stick my neck out, and God will bless it.

It's amazing what He's doing here. So many times we think, God, I want you to use my life, but here's what I need. I need, Lord, a three-year, five-year, 10-year plan.

I need you to spell it out, A to Z. Tell me what you're gonna do. Tell me what you require of me.

Tell me all these things. Do you understand God doesn't operate like this? I remember early on in the church, and we're projecting out and planning and doing things accordingly. I remember we'd been in the ministry for like a year or two.

The church had just started. We were just trying to hold on for dear life. And then some guy came in and he said, what's your five-year plan?

I probably shouldn't have laughed. I probably should have made some answer up, but I was like, brother, we're just watching God work. At some point, we need to begin planning.

And we're in that phase now. We're planning out and doing things and praying about things. But if you've ever found yourself in a place where you're not sure what Jesus is doing, it's okay. See, because nowhere in this book does it say that we're supposed to understand all things. The life lesson, we're not told to understand all things but to give thanks in all things. We're not told to understand all things but to give thanks in all things. Now, I understand.

You're probably like me in some ways. You want to know everything. You think you want to know everything.

You know what? I've come to the point, I don't want to know everything because there's things I don't need to know. There's things that you don't need to know. You are not wired and created to know everything. Do you understand that? Your brain can't hold everything. So be okay with it. See, because a lot of times, this can cause a lot of discontent in our lives. Why? Because we don't know something.

But there is this curiosity in us, right? I mean, somebody can go, just mention it in detail. Oh, what happened? Oh, what's he doing?

Oh, what's she doing? I didn't hear about that. All of a sudden, we're engaged. Do we need to know? Probably not. Friend, do you know for sure that your sins have been forgiven?

You can know right now. I want to lead you in a short, simple prayer, simply telling God you're sorry and asking Him to help you to live for Him. Please pray this prayer with me out loud right now. Dear Jesus, I believe you died for me, that I could be forgiven. And I believe you were raised from the dead, that I could have a new life. And I've done wrong things. I have sinned.

And I'm sorry. Please forgive me of all those things. Please give me the power to live for you all of my days. In Jesus' name.

Amen. Friend, if you prayed that prayer, according to the Bible, you've been forgiven. You've been born again. So congratulations, friend.

You just made the greatest decision that you will ever make. God bless you. If you prayed that prayer with David for the first time, we'd love to hear from you. You can visit CrossTheBridge.com to receive our First Steps package with helpful resources to help you begin your walk with Christ.

Or you can write to CrossTheBridge at P.O. Box 12515, Winston-Salem, North Carolina, 27117, and share how God is working in your life. You know, the Bible tells us that the free gift of God is eternal life in Jesus Christ our Lord. But it does cost for us to come and bring that message to you and to others in your neighborhood, through radio, through the Internet, and through the mobile technologies that God has gifted us to be able to use. So if you'd like to support this ministry, please go to CrossTheBridge.com, click on the donate button, and ask God how much he would have you give, either on a one-time basis or a continuing basis each month to help ensure that the teaching of God's word continues to go out through Cross the Bridge.

Thank you so much. Well, D.A., before we go, what are some ways that we can bless our listeners? Each day you can wake up with encouragement from Pastor David through the Word of God with his email devotional, life lessons to consider, a daily reading plan, and a thought to meditate on throughout your day from the heart of David McGee. Those are terrific, and it's easy and it's free. So, folks, sign up today at CrossTheBridge.com. Thanks again for listening, and join us next time as David McGee continues teaching verse by verse in the book of Acts.