Call to Commitment

  

The ascension and promise of His return

6.  Therefore, when they had come together, they asked Him, saying, "Lord, will You at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?" 

7.     And He said to them, "It is not for you to know times or seasons which the Father has put in His own authority. 

8.     But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be witnesses to Me in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth." 

9.     Now when He had spoken these things, while they watched, He was taken up, and a cloud received Him out of their sight. 

10.  And while they looked steadfastly toward heaven as He went up, behold, two men stood by them in white apparel, 

11.  who also said, "Men of Galilee, why do you stand gazing up into heaven? This same Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will so come in like manner as you saw Him go into heaven." 

 The disciples were preoccupied with the question posed in verse 6 the entire time that they followed Christ..."Lord, will You at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?" For that reason, James and John asked to sit on His right and left hand in His glory (Mr.10:37). It expressed the same concept, which the Jews, in general, had concerning the coming of the Messiah. They thought that He should be a great Prince of Peace, who would deliver Israel from the oppression of their enemies, especially the Romans, who ruled over them, during His time on earth. After He fed 5,000 men, plus women and children, there was a strong contingent among the people, who wanted to make Him king: “Therefore when Jesus perceived that they were about to come and take Him by force to make Him king, He departed again to the mountain by Himself alone” (Jn.6:15). He refused to walk the road that led to popularity and for that reason, He commanded those, who had experienced His miraculous power, that they should restrain from publicizing the good that had been done to them.  

 Why then have these good deeds been publicized in our Bibles and commonly proclaimed among the nations? The reason is clearly understood by the command given to Peter, James and John, as they descended from the Mount of Transfiguration: "Tell the vision to no one until the Son of Man is risen from the dead" (Mt.17:19). The admonition not to declare His supernatural works was a matter of timing, not principle. His immediate mission was a cross, not a throne. His physical reign would come in the Millenium; at the time of the book of Acts, He was beginning to develop a spiritual kingdom. One composer wrote, “He surveyed His kingdom from a cross.”

 

KJV    1611

Infallible proofs of the resurrection

1. The former account I made, O Theophilus, of all that Jesus began both to do and teach,

2. until the day in which He was taken up, after He through the Holy Spirit had given commandments to the apostles whom He had chosen, 

3. to whom He also presented Himself alive after His suffering by many infallible proofs, being seen by them during forty days and speaking of the things pertaining to the kingdom of God. 

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; 

5. for John truly baptized with water, but you shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now."  

Luke wrote both of his books to an acquaintance, whom he addressed, in his introduction to the Gospel of Luke, as the most excellent or most noble Theophilus.  Because the name means, Friend of God, some think that Luke used the name symbolically to address the reader of his books. However, the common believer is never given such a highly dignified title as most excellent, so I am sure that Theophilus was a member of the nobility, a high Roman or Greek official. Both Felix and Festus were addressed identically. Theophilus had been converted and Luke wrote his accounts to him, personally, to establish him in the faith.