The Times

0:00 Well, since the question was asked, what is written on my hand, I, I would like to play a short video for you and also show you. But if you guys don't mind playing that video, As we heard all the news coming out of Israel this last week, it could be easy to ask God, where are you? Where were you? Over a thousand people were killed ruthlessly in the streets, men, women, children, elderly. And this is not a new question. In fact, they, prophet Isaiah asked this question, he says in Isaiah 49, that Zion says, I, I have forsaken. Am I forgotten by God? And he then goes on to say, can a woman forget her nursing child?

0:46 Can she have not compassion on the son of her womb? He says, surely even these may forget. But I will not forget you, Israel, I've inscribed you on the palms of my hand. You are not forgotten. You are not forsaken. And so, as we have so many Christians around the world that are praying for Israel right now, we want to challenge you, the global church, to pray for Israel by name, just as the names of the children of Israel are inscribed on the palms of God's hands. We want to inscribe the names of these over a hundred hostages on our hands. There's over a hundred hostages right now in Gaza, children, women, men, and elderly. And we want to see God free the captive, release, the prison chains and rescue those that are currently in oppression. They're facing the darkest season of their lives. And so we're asking,

1:34 would you write the name of one of these hostages on the palm of your hand as a reminder to ourselves that they're not forgotten that we remember their name and they're remembered by God. They're inscribed on the palm of God's hand. We've already heard one miracle. The woman has escaped and was able to return back to Israel. We're believing God for miraculous rescue, for a miraculous saving of lives. And we're gonna do that by praying for Israel by name. So I wanna challenge you. I'm gonna challenge your church. I'm gonna challenge your faith community. Would you write the name of one of the hostages on your hand using a black marker and post a photo or a video of you praying for that individual? And would you use it as a reminder throughout the day when you look down at your hand? We're praying, we're remembering them because they're known by God. They're remembered by God, and they are not forgotten.

2:21 We wanna see a movement of a million Christians around the world that are praying for Israel by name. Will you join us? Michael is one of my dear friends and his wife also Vanessa. And, uh, and basically they oversee, uh, I think they're, I think Michael's actually second in charge of the ministry called Firm one of our ministry partners in the land of Israel. And this is, I I mentioned on, on, was it Wednesday night? I think I mentioned that there's another ministry, Tikkun Global,

3:07 who's doing 21 days of, um, prayer and fasting by, uh, following a Daniel fast, uh, as they call it. Uh, no, no meats. No suites. Um, so there's lots of these initiatives beginning to come. I I found this one particularly, um, moving, um, partially in. And so if you want, I I, I included their, the link to their website and in, uh, the u version app notes, if you're using YouVersion to access my notes. But I'll tell you the reason I chose the name. I did, number one, it's one of the hostage. They have the list of the hostages names on their website, and that's one of the names.

3:54 But also it happens to be the name of my niece's cousin who is serving, uh, in the front right now. So it just reminds me, uh, twice to pray. Um, so anyways, you can check out their website, uh, firm israel.org, pray by name, and there's the, the list of names that they have up on the website. We are starting into the book of Acts today. It is, you know, I prayed quite a bit about should we actually start the book of

4:42 Acts today, or should we go a different direction? Because everything in Israel is so heavy. And how did that fit with, with starting the book of Acts today? And, uh, by the way, for those of you who are praying, my dad is now back, um, he la landed on Thursday. Dave and Raquel are in transit. Um, I, I think they're boarding their next flight somewhere right around now. Um, but they, they made it to the island of Cyprus, missed their connecting flight and, and, and, uh, spent the night there last night. But now I, I believe that they're on their next flight or close to boarding if they haven't

5:31 already boarded. Um, just that's a, I forgot to update based upon our own congregation. Um, but so let's get into this, into, into acts. But before I get into acts, I wanna lay down some groundwork, uh, some of which has already been laid. Laid. Is that the lane? It's already been established, uh, over the last two years. Um, but we're gonna refresh our memories a little bit, and I want to remind us that Luke transitions from Luke to Acts. And so what we're going to do is we're gonna go back and reread the beginning of Luke, uh, the first few verses because it, it's,

6:19 it's an introduction to his work. And I believe it's an introduction, not just to Luke, but also to the Book of Acts. So Luke chapter one, verses one through four. Now, many have undertaken to organize an account of the events fulfilled among us just as they were handed down to us from the start by the eyewitnesses and reporters of the word. Therefore, it seemed best to me also because I have carefully investigated everything from the beginning to write for you in orderly record, most excellent Theophilus. So you may know for sure the truth of the words that you have been taught. Now, I introduced, I think,

7:05 every message for the last maybe four months on the Book of Luke by refreshing our memory and going back here in saying Luke is doing this for the, for, for the benefit of Theophilus. And it says, Luke gives his purpose so that you may know for sure the truth of the words that you have been taught. In other words, it seemed to me that Theophilus was already a follower of Yeshua. And now Luke is writing to encourage Theophilus. And because Luke is writing to encourage Theophilus, he's created an account that's an organized account. And it was, and he has examined or he has, uh, uh, spoken to or, uh, consulted both eyewitnesses and other reporters of

7:53 the word of what happened. So Luke is presenting this orderly account to us, and that account is now a accomplished, or it's finished. We've finished the book of Luke. And so now we are beginning to transition to the Book of Acts. But it's important to go back and, and, and look at the beginning of Luke because that introduction seems to apply also to the book of Acts. In other words, that Luke has organized an account that he has consulted eyewitnesses and other reports of what has happened. And in fact, as, as we will find, as we will discover probably in a year and a half from now,

8:41 uh, because it's in the second half of the book, maybe in a year maybe I can get, be optimistic and say in a year. Um, but we will see that the, the dialogue of the Book of Acts changes from a third person narrator to a first person narrator as if the narrator is there, in other words, as if Luke is present. And so, as we will see later on, it is at least my belief that Luke was one of the eyewitnesses to what happens, at least in the second half of the book of Acts. So Luke is setting up that he's taken this time to present this orderly account, this introduction, and that he's examined these variety of sources

9:26 and eyewitnesses. And now that we transition from Luke to Acts, I just also want to go and remind us of a few other things. First of all, we take for granted that the author is Luke himself. So I just want to want to ask a couple questions. Who is Luke? Because whenever we come to a book, we should ask these questions. Who is this person that's presenting this information? Who are they presenting the information to? Uh, what are they talking about? When does it happen? Where is it happening? All of these affect what is actually being written. So Luke, here's the interesting thing.

10:13 We jump in and make these assumptions that Luke is both the author of Luke and Ax, without ever actually asking the question, is he, or even the question, who is Luke? So the question is, who is Luke? And, and we have a couple different answers. Actually. One of the answers is he could be a traveling companion of Paul's, which we can, we, we have to, we'll have to make a, a couple of assumptions, but I think it's relatively safe. We can assume that he's a traveling companion of Paul's, because in the last half of the book, when he's traveling with Paul, he says, we not them. If that makes sense. So it would make him as a traveling companion of Paul. Well,

11:00 the nice thing about the New Testament is actually, and certainly Pauline writings, is Paul actually gives us names of his traveling companions. Paul says, Hey, so and so sends their greetings, by the way, so and so is here imprisoned with me. And, and, and, and also, can you bring a coat like Paul does all of these things in his letters. And so in one of Paul's letters, actually in two, we see the mention of someone named Luke Tradition Church tradition connects Luke to the, Luke mentioned in Colossians chapter four.

11:48 And Paul says this, Luke, the dearly loved physician, sends you greetings, and so does Demas. So the question is, is this the same Luke that's the author of Luke and Ax, there's another Luke mentioned in, uh, philamon 20, verse 24. So do Mark, Arista, Demas, and Luke, my fellow workers, and then also in two Timothy four 11. Luke is the only one with me, man. Talk about some good Jewish guilt. Luke is the only one with me. Please get Mark and bring him with you for, he is useful to me for service. He's writing to Timothy at this point.

12:37 But those aren't the only mentions of Luke. It just so happens those names are, are in the Greek Lucas. And what we see in Romans chapter 16, verse 20, uh, 21, Paul is again mentioning companions. He says, Timothy, my fellow worker greets you. So do Lucius and Jason, Jason and Soat, my kin or other words. In other words, my family, my, my tribesmen. Lucius is just the Latinized version. Uh, uh, or, or maybe I can say it this way. Um, Robert, let's take a name that we're familiar with. Robert.

13:23 A shortened version of Robert's name is Bob, right? So in Latin it's Lucius and it's shortened in Greek to Luke, if that makes sense. It's Lucas, but it it just comes out as Luke. It's like Robert to Bob almost, but, but across languages. So it could be that this is the same person, Lucius, or it could be that it's a different Luke Lucius is, I, I think the percentage I read is one, well, in, in terms of males in the first century, I think it was 23% of Roman males were named Lucius. So there's a lot of Lucius, Lucci,

14:10 Lukes, there's a lot of Lukes. Uh, so it could be that it's the same, it could be that it's someone different. We don't know for certain. But I think what I can safely say, Well, before I safely say let's, let's examine a couple more things. His language in the book of, in, in both Luke and Acts indicates that Luke, the author, uh, is highly educated and also it's likely that he's an, uh, addressing an audience that is above average in their education, just by the terminology he uses the Greek that he uses, uh, to communicate. But all of this does, it necessitate the belief or the understanding that Luke,

15:00 the physician who was the traveling companion of Paul, does it necessitate that, that Luke is the author of Luke and Acts? Well, simply the answer is no. It doesn't necessitate that. Why? Because one in four men in Rome, in in Italy were called Lucius. It could be any number of hundreds of of Lucius of Luke's. That's a hard, that's a hard one. It's interesting because also Paul has a traveling companion with him who's a doctor. And it seems that that would be helpful for Paul because Paul experiences various illnesses and other, uh, maladies often he,

15:48 he gets bit by serpents. He like all of these things. Paul gets sick. It would be nice to have a doctor around. In fact, I'll tell you Daniel, when he was here, uh, on staff for man, was that three years certainly felt like only two months. But when Daniel was on staff, I would always call Daniel, look, I did this. Like, do I need to, do I need to go to the hospital or not? And he would always go, well, listen, first of all, I'm not a doctor in the United States. Second of all, you should always consult a medical professional. That's a, that's a licensed authorized in the hospital person. And then he goes, thirdly, I don't think it's worth it. And I go, thank you.

16:33 That was the answer I was looking for. And, uh, anyway, I'm saying all that because it was very helpful having Daniel on staff. I could just call. I, it was almost like I had a doctor at hand. Hey, bud, can you stay with mom Here, bud? No, you can't. Okay, I'll give you kisses. Physicians at this today, we, well, I think most of us tend to have high regard or high respect for physicians, for doctors. You know, doctors, they come outta school with hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt. Generally, they go to school for like, as long as my children have been alive before they can actually practice

17:21 medicine or, or something like that. But physicians in, in this time period, uh, maybe not exactly the same. They, they, it wasn't like what we have today. The physicians, they would tr they would train underneath the, the person, um, may maybe in apprentice as an apprentice. And, and there was some experimental medicine going on at this point. So, you know, like we've heard the, we've heard old tales of bloodletting and, and all of these different things. And, and I read one account of someone who, the, who prescribed the cure for gluttony was to make yourself throw up. And I thought, oh, I don't think that works the way you think that works. Uh,

18:07 but anyways, the, the physicians in this time period, uh, is a little bit different than today. In fact, there, there's some evidence that a high, a high percentage of physicians during this time period were actually slaves or servants, uh, in, in the Roman empire, Luke being a physician. So again, we're talking about, we're talking about Luke and tradition, church tradition places Luke, uh, as a Gentile, uh, as someone who's not j not not born Jewish,

18:55 and, and that he's a doctor, I dunno, part of me is like, well, it just makes sense if he's Jewish and a doctor, because like Jews believe that life begins when you get your medical degree. Come on, y'all. That's a joke. I mean, partially, it's a partial joke. It's funny because there's truth in it, but it just seems, I don't know, maybe, maybe he's Jewish. Maybe he could be Jewish. But it's interesting because then we begin to ask the question, who are the doctors in the Jewish world? And when we begin to delve into that, doctors in the Jewish world at this time period would've

19:43 had a lot to do with the priesthood. Why can, why do I say that? Because Leviticus lays out all of these things that the priests are supposed to do. If you get a mark on your body, if you get a hair that's a certain color hair, and if it doesn't change colors, and what do you do with this mark if it changes colors, but what if it doesn't change colors? What do you do if the mark spreads all of these different things? It seems like doctor stuff to me, but it's all in the priesthood. So it seems to me that it might make sense if doctor might also, or I'm sorry, if a priest might also be a doctor in his off time. Now again, you say, well, wouldn't he have been like preaching all the time?

20:33 No, because there were 24 divisions of the priesthood in the 24 divisions served two weeks a year, plus then they all, every division was mandated to be present in the temple. Um, for the, for the three, uh, for the three, what we call the pilgrimage holidays for Passover, uh, Shavuot and Sukkot. Why? Because you have this swell of humanity who comes and offers up all of their offerings. And so you need every hand on deck to process the meat, the brisket, but, um, Oh, the heavenly aromas. But they only serve three weeks out of the year. That leaves,

21:19 at least on our calendar, what is it, 51 other weeks that, or, or maybe, maybe let's just round, let's just call it five weeks, at least 49 other weeks. You can't make a, a living working five weeks out of the year and, and, and provide for your family. So you have to have other occupations, other occupations. Common among the, the, the, the Levites, the Levitical tribe would've been being a scribe. Why? Because you're already in the Torah. You might as well write it out. And so scribes would've been a, a secondary occupation. Well, what does it seem that Luke is here? It seems that he's a scribe, someone who's writing out an account.

22:05 I I'm building my case for Luke as the doctor and the physician, uh, not doctor and physician as the doctor and the scribe that he is actually the author. In fact, I'll just, I'll leave it there. I actually, my, I, one of the commentaries I'm referencing, he even mentions this, and he goes, it's a big jump to get to this point. Well, I'm taking a big jump because I feel like it's a, it's a, it's a calculated big jump, but it, to me, it seems like Luke is, is actually Jewish. He may even be a part of the Levitical tribe. Now, that's,

22:52 I recognize that's a pretty big jump, But he is certainly one of Paul's traveling companions. And if we take early church tradition who were, who were technically closer to the events than we are now, then they had a little bit of weight with, with, with why they chose what they chose. So let's talk about the date that this was, that this was written. So this is where it becomes your one choice affects another choice. I don't know if anybody has ever told you that, but if nobody's ever told you that that's true across life, one choice always affects another choice. So if we choose Luke as the author,

23:39 and we choose Luke as the traveling companion of Paul, and that particular Luke, if he's the author, then it dictates when the book was written because it had to have been written within his lifespan, and his lifespan would've probably not extended beyond 90. Uh, and that may be a, that may be a a little bit generous, but his lifespan, something would've, he if, if we assume that he was somewhere in his twenties or thirties when he joined Paul. And if, and if that was somewhere around, uh, 48 to 50, and, and then we take the average lifespan and add it to that, then we, we get to something around the 85 mark period,

24:26 maybe 90. So it it, if you choose Luke as your author and that Luke is the same Luke who was the traveling companion of Paul, then you have to choose that the book was written down. The account was written down before 90 ish. I'm, I'm doing loosely with you, but actually I, so according to one survey, the book, I, I'm getting into some technical stuff, and we will get to the text itself in a little bit. I'm just giving us some floor, uh, some groundwork here. According to one survey, the book being authored and published in the sixties. So, and that would be what we would call the ad sixties or the, the six, you know, about 30 years after the, um, life,

25:14 death and Resurrection of Yeshua. One survey says that 28% of scholars at, at a given period about 1500 years ago believed that it was written in the sixties. 44% believed it was written in the seventies or eighties, which means that 72% of scholars believe that it was written before the nineties, if I can put it that way. That's a, that's a, seems to me to be an overwhelming majority. Now, there are arguments otherwise, and I, and I'm not gonna get into those, but I want to, I I, I tend to be in early date authorship, so I tend to tend to the sixties for a couple reasons.

26:02 Number one, the death of James isn't mentioned. James was the most prominent member of the Jewish community of believers in that time period. You see James in action in Acts 15, and again, in Acts 21, when Paul comes and James says, listen, they all think that you've gone nuts, you and think that you're doing all this stuff and you're not Jewish anymore. You need to go to the, the temple and offer a sacrifice. And Paul says, Paul doesn't even question. I wanna point out, it's not even, Paul says, I don't know if I need to, he doesn't even question James because James's authority is so high, he immediately turns and goes to the temple, and we'll get to that in maybe two years.

26:50 But Paul, Paul goes, and that's the last mention of James, but the death of James occurs in the year 62 ce the death of Paul. So the, the, the book ends while Paul is in prison in Rome, and it kind of leaves you hanging. There's not a whole lot of conclusion to the book, and you're like, I need some more, please. But it doesn't include the death of Paul, which perhaps was somewhere right around 64. And to me, the most telling Is it doesn't include the destruction of the temple in 70. And and why do I say that's the most telling? Because the destruction of the temple

27:38 is the second worst thing that has ever happened. Because the first worst thing was the destruction of the first temple on the same day. How many, what is that? Uh, 650, no, 600 and something years earlier. It seems to me that something so significant would've been included in Paul or in, in the Book of Acts. So now we come to the audience while we, we recognize he's writing to, he wrote the first volume to Theophilus. He's writing the second volume to Theophilus. Theophilus, uh, was a common gentile name. It was also a common diaspora Jewish name.

28:27 It also happened to be the name of one of the high priests that served just after the time of Yeshua, and also was the father of one of the high priests that served during the time of James and Paul. But is the, is the audience just Theophilus? Well, it's likely that he's actually addressing more than Theophilus, but he's addressing Theophilus first and then others, um, in addition to, it would be like when, when we have a bar or Bat mitzvah and I address the bar or Bat Mitzvah child, but all of you are here as well, and I'm, I'm not just addressing the one, but I'm addressing everyone, uh, that you would, you would have this multifaceted, um, uh, audience.

29:14 The, there have been so many questions. Is the audience in the land of Israel in the, in the diaspora? Where is the audience? We're not entirely sure. Is it a mix? Is it something in the, in the, in the land, or is it some outta the land? We're not entirely sure. Uh, I will come back to that one in just a minute. The genre of this book, so we talked about the book of Luke. The book of Luke is, is like a bibliography, uh, bibliography that's not the right, uh, like a, a biography, not bibliography. It's like one of those Graff words. Words. It's like a biography and that it addresses the life of Yeshua in and what he did. In fact, the opening account in the book of Acts says,

29:59 this is what Yeshua did and taught. That's what I told you in the book of Luke. Now, we move into the book of Acts, and it seems that the book is something in like, in the genre of what is known as histo. It's like history. I'm not even gonna try to pronounce the word Histori choreography. Gr gr that one. Anyways, it's akin to modern history, but it's not exactly the same. Uh, it would've been important for the author to have most of the stories or, and or speech accounts as accurate, because if he's writing to an audience that actually remembers it, if he writes something that's inaccurate, they're gonna not believe anything else that he writes. So we,

30:46 we can actually assume that, that Luke is actually pretty accurate. Uh, in terms of purposes for the book, there, there's so many different purposes that that authors have high or the, the commentators have highlighted. I, I would just wanna mention a few, um, that there's number one, uh, the purpose of, um, what we would call the thrust of the movement, uh, meaning this has become the mission of the followers of Yeshua. The Book of Luke started and finished in Jerusalem. The Book of Acts starts in Jerusalem and finishes in Rome. Now that has been used to say things like

31:32 Luke was done with the Jewish people and decided that everything went from the Jewish people, and now it's, it's for the nations or for Rome. Rome being the most prominent, um, capital at the time of, of, well, obviously it's the Roman Empire. And, and that this would, this would lead to an understanding that, that God has shifted his focus from the Jewish people to the nations. I'm not telling you, that's what I believe. I'm telling you that that is some belief. Some, there's another, uh, uh, uh, theme that emerges, that recognizes God's continuing activity here on Earth. And, and so that this is what Luke is drawing our attention to through the Book of Acts. Another one is how the readers are hearers of Acts.

32:21 Because it wasn't just that you would read the book, the book would be dramatized in a setting or, or in a reading, if you will. And so you would hear the book and how the readers or hearers of the Book of Acts should respond to persecution. This is another, another theme, a recurring theme within the Book of Acts. There's just multiple examples how the body of Messiah, another theme should carry out the mission, the mission being from Jerusalem, Judea, and Samaria to the end of the earth. This could be another, maybe we can say this a different way, is, is if this is our mission, how should we live? And this is then how we live.

33:09 And that in Judaism is called Halakha. It's how we walk out our faith day today, is that what the Book of Acts is, is drawing our eye to, there's another proposal that actually, there's a certain level of comparison going on between Peter and Paul, Peter being the prominent figure for the first half of the book of Acts. And there's a slow transition starting around 13, where Paul becomes the primary focal point of the book of Acts. But when you look and you lay the, the books down, uh, not the books, but the, if you split it in half and you lay it down side by side, Peter and Paul's life, you'll see they have similar speeches, they have similar miracles,

33:54 and they have similar, uh, persecutions all in the same order. And that it's comparing Paul to Peter. Well, why would somebody compare Paul to Peter at this point? Because Peter is a well-known, recognized figure who had the apostolic authority given from Yeshua. And there's the proposal is, is that this is putting Paul alongside Peter to show that Paul is not crazy, that he's actually operating within the parameters of God and that, and not even just that, but he's even comparable to Peter. It is an interesting, and, and what we know and what we see is Peter had a mission to the Jewish people,

34:41 but as Peter, who gets the first taste, if you will, of what is to go to the, to the gentiles, to the nations, uh, with, with, uh, well, I use taste proverbially, but I recognize it starts in Acts 10 and, and it has to do with taste. Well, we'll get to Acts 10 in probably a year. Um, so we'll, we'll talk about that in a year. But this, this Peter and Paul business is, is very interesting. And if Peter is, if Paul is being compared to Peter and Paul is being confirmed that he has not forsaken his Jewish status or his Jewish way of life, if you will, then the Book of Acts could actually have been a written record to the Jerusalem

35:26 community as a witness to the life of Paul in the diaspora. Why would you do that? Well, the Jerusalem community has the most weight in the body of Messiah before the year 70. And if you have to defend Paul, it's gonna be to the Jerusalem community before the year 70. After the year 70. The, the, the defense doesn't matter because that community is, is, is is diaspora. I I just created, it's like when you say, I want to Google something, Google's not a verb, by the way. We, we make nouns, verbs in all the sort anyways, but it also,

36:13 this, this idea of, of justifying Paul and his mission is actually also forcing the Jewish community to consider the mission to the Gentiles equally as important as the mission to the Jewish people. So now we come to the actual text. I know I just took like 30 minutes to, to lay out some foundation, but that foundation will be important for us as we go for the next, i, I don't know, two years maybe. I dunno. It depends. A year and a half depends on how many barn bat mitzvahs we have. Let's come to, let's, let's enter into the text here, the Book of Acts, chapter one verse one.

37:01 I wrote the first volume Theophilus about all that Yeshua began to do and teach. So lemme stop here. No, let me, lemme finish, lemme do first two up to the day, he was taken up after he had given orders by the Ruak Hakodesh, the Holy Spirit to the emissaries he had chosen. So Luke is connecting his first writing the book of Luke with the current volume, the book of Acts here in the very first phrase of the book. By, by doing this, I'm, now I'm coming back to what I shared with you earlier. It seems to me that it's an appropriate thing to apply the introduction to the book of Luke as an, uh, also to the book of Acts. Now, what does that mean practically? It means that we can say that Luke took

37:48 the same amount of careful study or investigation that he did for the Book of Luke, where he says, I went and I investigated, uh, reports, I investigated eyewitnesses, I talked to all of these different people, and now I've compiled an orderly account. We can take that same level of investigation and apply it to the book of Acts. Now, the other thing that we can apply is the purpose that he gives. Now, this is, this is where I'm becoming me and all of the commentaries are going out the window because I believe that we can apply the purpose. What, what did I say the purpose was for the Book of Luke, so that you may know for sure what you have already been taught about Yeshua, the Messiah, writing to Theophilus.

38:35 So if that's the case, and we're gonna go into this a little bit more in just a second, if that's the case, then now we're not just talking about Yeshua, but now we're talking about his followers and, and other people who are beginning to hear, so that you may know for sure what the Lord is doing, how God is intervening in history today, and and what are the miraculous accounts that are coming out. I can tell you now, I'm now, I'm, I'm being looped. I can tell you that because I've carefully investigated all of these things. I've investigated the reports, the wit, eyewitnesses, and in fact, I am an eyewitness because I'm, I was on the boat when all of this was happening. So you can see that, that Luke is now transitioning to a next generation of followers.

39:23 He's addressing the same audience, Theophilus, and he reminds Theophilus about all about the Book of Luke and about all that Yeshua began to do and teach. It seems to me to be setting up a paradigm in the Book of Luke. You see, all the Yeshua began to do and teach. And in the book of Acts, you see all that the disciples began to do and teach. It sets this up for us to better understand or when we hear or read, it helps us classify in our brains and file them away, uh, for later that there, that there will be deeds and also teachings, and you can look through the book of Acts. And that's exactly what there are. There's speeches, what are called speeches or teachings and deeds,

40:12 and then it says that Yeshua was taken up, and here we are connected, uh, to the prophetic ministries of Elijah and Elisha and the passing of their mantle from one to the other. So when Yeshua said, when it says he was taken up, Yeshua is taken up, there's this understanding in the Jewish hearer that connects 'em to Elijah and Elijah that says, if he's taken up, then the mantle comes down. And those who were remaining carry the mantle of what Yeshua was doing in teaching. In other words, uh, what, what, what Luke says that here, that the, it's, he says, um, he had given orders by the Ruak Hakodesh to the emissaries that the spirit of

40:59 God is being, uh, is, is ordering these events that Yeshua is going up and the transfer of leadership of the, of the community, the body of Messiah to the disciples with that transfer of, uh, of, of leadership responsibility. And in the first book, we read all about what Yeshua did, and now we're gonna read all about what the disciples do. And so then we move on to verse three. To them, he showed himself to be alive after his suffering through many convincing proofs, appearing to them for 40 days and speaking about the kingdom of God. Now, while staying with them, he commanded them not to leave Jerusalem, but to wait for what the father promised, which he said,

41:44 you heard from me for John immersed with water, but you'll be immersed in the kodesh. Not many moment, not many days from now, Yeshua appeared what the text tells us, Yeshua appeared to his disciples and others for a period of 40 days after his resurrection. The problem is the book of Luke, Luke chapter 24, gives us what Yeshua did post-resurrection. But it says that he met with his disciples and then he ascended into heaven. So now what we're seeing is that there's this, um, inclusion of new information that Yeshua was there for 40 days. So actually what, what happened at the end of the book of Luke isn't just a one day thing. It happened for 40 days by including this new information,

42:29 Luke is alerting his audience to be aware of new information that may come along the way. Yeshua commands them, commands the, the disciples, those who are there at his ascension, he commands them to remain in Jerusalem so that they could be immersed in the ruakaka kodesh, not many days from now. Well, they're nearing sha I already mentioned this, uh, man, was it a month ago, I guess about a month ago, they were nearing Shavuot. This was a time when Jewish men, uh, were required to go up to Jerusalem anyways. And so being a Jewish man, they're like, okay, you know, I might as well not go home and come back.

43:15 I might as well just stay here for a few days and, uh, you know, save, save a little extra effort. But it's not just that. I want you to notice that Yeshua operated in the, uh, with the covering of the Ruakaka Kodesh. You see it in when the, when the dove comes down in the beginning of Luke, uh, right before he enters into his ministry. And, and he goes into his ministry, uh, following 40 days of trial testing in the wilderness. But now what he's saying is he's telling his disciples that the Holy Spirit is going to come down on them. So you see, there's this transfer, if you will, of leadership and responsibilities by the Holy Spirit

44:02 from Yeshua to the disciples here in Acts chapter one. And he says, you stay here. Don't go do anything until you have this why? Because if you go do things until before, you're doing it outside of my will. You're doing it outside of the will of the Lord, but you stay here until the ruach comes down and you are immersed in the ruach. And then the Spirit would enable them to go forth and accomplish the mission that he's actually about to give them in the next verse. So let's, let's, or in the next three verses, so let's go to the next three verses. So when they gathered together, they asked him the verse six and following, Lord, are you restoring the kingdom of to Israel at this time? And he said to them, it's not your place to know the times or the seasons,

44:50 which the Father has placed under his own control. There's a, there's like a, it's like a, uh, a, a a, a diversion is inserted right here. So he says, you stay here until the ruach comes down upon you so that for the, the ruach will enable you in the mission that I'm about to give you. And they say, God is this. They say, Yeshua, is this the time when you're gonna restore the kingdom to Israel? By the way, the question is normal. It's not a nuts. So question, the question is normal because he's already mentioned that there's a promise of power or the ruach coming from on high. And Luke often references back to the book of Isaiah. And throughout Isaiah, there's, there are, uh, and,

45:38 and significantly in the latter half, but but also throughout the whole thing, throughout Isaiah, the good news and or power from on high are immediately connected with the restoration of the kingdom of Israel. The two go hand in hand in the book of Isaiah, the power will come from on high, and then God will come down and judge the nations, and the kingdom will be restored to Israel. It's like one, it is not even like one and two, it's like one A and one B. And so they go, woo-hoo, Rome's about to be gone. And they said, is this the time? And he goes, hold your horses for a second boy. Just, just, just, just hold,

46:27 hold on here for a moment. He says, it is not your place to know the times of the seasons which the father has placed under his control. In other words, he's telling them, don't focus on the times, focus on the mission that I'm giving you, not about what's your circumstances that are happening, but focus on the mission that I'm giving you. And the mission is, well, by the way, the reason they're not supposed to focus on the times is because it's under the father's control. When we begin to think about what is under God's control, and if we can then take that and say,

47:14 don't worry about what's under God's control, focus on the task that God has already given us. Can I just tell you how much that relieves the burden that is on our shoulders? Because all of us are consumed with worry and anxiety based upon wars, rumors of wars and earthquakes and tornadoes and everything. You know what? You can't control it. Every dad in the neighborhood goes out the front door when the tornado sirens goes on going, let's see, can I see it? You can't control it. Don't worry about what God has in control. You focus on what God has given us to focus on and namely our mission.

48:02 What are we supposed to be doing? Focus on the mission at hand. It reminds me, I'm I'm detouring just for, just for a brief second. It reminds me of Peter and I use this story all the time of Peter when he gets out of the boat, when Yeshua's walking on the water and he goes, Hey, is that you? Is that you, Yeshua, if it's you, tell me to come to you and I'm gonna come to you by, by the way, Peter is so enthusiastic, it's amazing. And, and, and Yeshua says, come Peter jumps out of the boat. I I mean, it says that he was walking. I imagine Peter's like running toward him like Peter's full-hearted,

48:49 full throttle. There's nothing, there's, there's nothing but on and off in Peter's life. And, and, and Peter's going, and his mission is he's looking to Yeshua, but then he begins to notice the waves and the storm, and he begins to look around and it's, when he looks around that he begins to sink. Why? Because he's looking at what is in the father's control, not the mission at hand. It's not speaking that Peter was this poor disciple. Peter was the only one who got outta the boat. The rest of 'em sat on their rears and said, we'll paddle to you, maybe if we can turn the boat that way. But it's important at this point that Yeshua is telling them you focus

49:38 on the mission at hand, not what the father has in his control. So now, here we get the mission in verse eight, but you will receive power when the Ruak Hakodesh has come upon you. You remember Yeshua said, you wait around until the spirit of the Lord comes upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem through all Judah and Samaria, and to the end of the earth. They are going to receive power, the power of the Ruakaka Kodesh for the purpose of being Yeshua's witnesses. Now, I'm really glad that this is the week that we're introing acts because last week, rabbi Sean talked about what it was like to be a witness,

50:26 talked about it in terms of the shaman. What what does it mean to be a witness? It it has a courtroom legality term. Uh, um, note to it, when you are official and you're in a courtroom, you gotta go in there and you gotta raise your right hand and repeat after me. I so state your name, da, da, da, da, like you are becoming an official witness. And what are you a witness to? You are a witness to what you have seen and heard. And so Yeshua is saying, you will be my witnesses. What are we witnessing? Last week, rabbi Sean mentioned that we witness the oneness of our God,

51:14 the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the God of Israel. Yeshua is turning around and saying the exact same thing. He says, you will be my witnesses. You'll be the witness of the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and you will go forth and teach about me and do miraculous things and, and disciple others in my way, in the way that I walk. And so where do we go? Excuse me. I'm, I'm, uh, where do the, uh, I'm trying to keep us, I'm trying to keep us separate from the text. Where do the disciples go? Where are they supposed to bear witness? They're supposed to bear witness in Jerusalem, Judah, and Samaria,

51:59 and then to the end of the earth. So I want, I want, if you guys can pull up the, the picture that I emailed. Uh, yeah, that one. Perfect. This was a common map of the world during this time period. At the center is Jerusalem, and it was commonly thought, oh, I say it at this time, but it has America down there. So this maybe is not quite that old. Anyways, it's an, it's a, it's an artistic rendition. What you have is going north and west, you have what is known as Europe. You have going north and East Asia,

52:46 and you have going South Africa, and at the center is Jerusalem and just be just outside of Jerusalem. You have Jerusalem, and then you have Judah and Samaria. So you see, when you go out first, you go out of the city and you go into the, to like that local country, if I can put it that way. And then after that, it's then to the ends of the Earth. It seems if you can get to the end, if you guys can just point at the ends of each one of those leafs, if you get to the end of those, then you've accomplished the ends of the earth. Paul says over and over and over again, my goal is to go,

53:32 uh, in, in, in the modern, um, country to go to Spain, because Spain was the end of Europe. It was the tip. Why? Because he thought Yeshua was coming back in his lifetime, and if he could get the message to the end of the earth, then Yeshua would come back somehow. I feel like that Fervency has been lost a little bit. But I also want to point out that every time that the, that the good news travels outward, so it travels outward from Jerusalem to Judah and Samaria. You see this in, in, um, uh, acts eight,

54:18 I think is when they get into a a and Philip engages with a, with an Ethiopian eunuch, um, in Samaria, if I remember right. We'll get there in like nine months maybe, but he engages there. But then the action in the book of Luke Al, I mean, the book of Acts always draws back to Jerusalem. So every time it goes out, it comes back. So when it goes out to Judah and Samaria, it comes back to Jerusalem. When it goes out into the nations, what what happens in, in Acts 21, Paul comes back to Jerusalem, and Paul then goes to Rome, and the book is left hanging with Paul in Rome,

55:04 anticipating the back to Jerusalem. Now, I also want to point out Paul's trying to go to the edge of Europe. There could be an idea if Philip is going, uh, not Philip, but if the Ethiopian Euch is going back to Ethiopia, that he'll, he'll go to the, to the ends of Africa, which leaves one left. You can see if you, if you think about it in their minds, they were two thirds of the way accomplished. And here we are 2000 years later, I and I, somebody mentioned, uh, sometime in the last couple months that I think, I can't remember who I heard this from or exactly what it was, but the Bible is now in every tribe in the world

55:54 or something. I, it was one of our guest speakers a couple months ago, I can't remember. It was as an astounding thought, or maybe they expect maybe they anticipated within the next two years, maybe that's what it was. And I was just like, oh my goodness. Like literally, we are seeing scripture being fulfilled in our day. Things that they only hope to see are things that we get to see. Now, I wonder at the end of the book, we leave Paul in Rome. I do wonder if partially it's a literary device, but also partially if the sentiment is beginning to shift against

56:42 Jerusalem and if the siege is becoming close. And maybe that's partially why it's not going back to Jerusalem at this point. I don't know. I, to me, I think the, the most impactful is, is that the rest of the book of Acts has to be accomplished through us. The Luke leaves off, he's gone to Judi, Judah, and Samaria. He's gone now to the ends of the earth, and it's our job to finish the ends of the earth and then to go back to Jerusalem with the message. So what does this mean for you and me? In fact, actually, before I do this, can you guys pop up the other picture I emailed you during service?

57:31 No, you didn't get it. Oh, anyways, I I'll just describe it to you because you guys can go out and see it. There's a map on the wall behind me, not this wall here, but in the breezeway. Uh, you could go look at that map. It's a map of the world, and you can see where the ends of the world are, and you can begin to pray that the Lord brings it back to Jerusalem. Jerusalem is marked. Israel is marked right in the middle. So what does this mean for us? If we are hearers and the readers of this book, how can we be encouraged in our faith today? First of all, Amanda said it at the end of prayer, at the end of praise, at the end of the time of music,

58:16 our father in heaven has everything in his hand. Everything is in his control. It doesn't matter how tumultuous the times seem to be. He has it all in his control, in his grasp. He will continue to show covenant faithfulness to his people for and forever. Ola, ed, ed and all of us can bear witness to that. The continued existence of his people today speaks to that very reality. Even during the darkness that we see in Israel today,

59:04 the reality is our existence proves God's faithfulness. This is why the enemy is consistently trying to wipe us out, because as long as we exist, It proves God's faithfulness. And can I just say something? He will never be successful because God is always faithful. Therefore, our God is mightier than him. We may experience darkness. In fact, I took my kids to, uh, one of those, uh, what it is, a cave where stalactites and sag mites, the, the ups and downs.

59:51 I took my kids into one of those, uh, a few years ago, and we got down to the cavern and, and the the lady said the tour were guys. She goes, okay, now everybody turn. We're gonna turn all the lights off. By the way, when you're in a cave like a couple hundred feet below the ground and there's no light, there it is. Everything is dark fact. It's a darkness that you can feel that it begins to weigh on you. But can I tell you what's crazy? One light and the darkness, fleas just one little itty bitty light of a flicker of a candle that may or may not, may not be blown out by the wind

1:00:41 sheds light and releases and scares the darkness away. Those are the times that we live in. The Lord has empowered us through the ruak hakodesh to be his witnesses, where in Jerusalem, Judah, and Samaria and to the end of the earth. Now, more than ever before in my my lifetime, certainly we need to be witnesses concerning the Lord's everlasting faithfulness to his people. It is not up to us to know the times or the seasons. It is up to us to follow the mission. Now, I'm not telling you,

1:01:27 you can't recognize the times because they are recognizable. The scriptures talk about the birth payings of, of when the, when the world will, will come. It's like a woman in labor. I know I've told my wife's labor story multiple times, but just one more time. And she's not in here. Oops. When you're, when you're pregnant, you do all these like half happy nesting things like, oh, let's make a nice little room. It's so nice. But when you get to the right season, everything changes. And my wife had had, uh,

1:02:14 Braxton Hicks contractions for about a week with one of our children, maybe I think it was eight days. And finally the night that, that our daughter was, this was our second daughter, the night she was born. My wife looks at me and she's crying and she says, this baby is never going to come Because It'd been eight nights in a row at the same time every night of contractions. And I looked at her and I said, sweetie, the one thing I know for certain is that baby is not gonna live in you forever. You know what the birth pangs may be here, but I know for certain that some point Yeshua will return that some point.

1:03:00 The pain that we experience here will bring forth new life And that Yeshua will be here, and that his kingdom will be birthed into our physical reality. And man, looking forward to that day, a Venus sha may, our father in heaven. Lord, we thank you for this day. I thank you for this. Um, Lord, I thank you for the book of Acts, Lord, as we begin to delve into the Book of Acts, I thank you that you have given this to us as an example for how to live our lives and, and how to focus on you and focus on the mission at hand. And I pray that you would continue to spur us on Lord, to follow you, to speak about you,

1:03:47 to be witnesses about Yeshua, Lord in Jerusalem, and Judah and Samaria, and to the end of the earth. Lord, we bless you and praise you in Yeshua's name. Amen. May the Lord bless you and keep you. May the Lord make his face shine upon you and be gracious to you. May the Lord lift his countenance upon you and give you peace

1:04:56 in the name of our Messiah, Yeshua.